SCatTL, Episode 2: Beware the Ladies of the Coopergiwa Clan
by Lost and Never Found
Summary: Part of Sly Cooper and the Thieves' Legacy series, a Sly 6 AU. The first stop to travel back in time and find out what is threatening the Cooper family's future, Sly and the Lady Masque team up with Karin Coopergiwa, who is having issues with a lord from her past. The samurai lady is quiet but fierce, with knowledge to pass down to Sly that strangely didn't make it into the book...
1. Return of the Ninja…Sorta

**I know, I know, long time coming. I had to get my life in order and figure out what the crap was going on with this universe now that it is confirmed there is no Sly 5, and what order things have to go in. I should be set up now. This episode is complete. Chapters update on Sunday.**

 **Standard disclaimers apply, I don't own Sly (if I did, we'd have more games).**

* * *

 **Return of the Ninja…Sorta**

* * *

The van slid across a dirt road meant for wagons, not motor vehicles. This was the country, more forests and hills, and at night, with no street lights. It was a miracle they didn't crash…or just the skill of a very good driver. It went down the curvy road until it reached a bamboo patch heavy enough to disguise the van from obvious sight. It slid to a bouncy halt and all was silent, until even the crickets and other night creatures started to make noise…mostly to get away from the strange contraption that had wrecked their home.

Sly Cooper, the only surviving member of the famous Cooper family, opened the back door of the van, carefully making sure no one was going to stumble on their temporary hiding place. It was far too easy to slip into the paranoid mindset time travel required. The male raccoon was in the prime of his life, in his mid-twenties and physically fit. But he was a little too strained, too fine tuned to an outside observer. Something had put him through a ringer one time too many.

He held his hand out to the seemingly empty door. "It's clear. Let's go take a look around."

There was dead silence, and no sign of movement from inside the van.

Scowling, Sly dropped his hand in an annoyed jerk. "Lady!" It was obviously a name, not a title.

"No need to yell, sugah," a female voice admonished from the depths of the van. It was a little husky, with a flirtatious edge. "Why do yah need me to help scope out 'Feudal Japan'?" The air quotes were audible.

"Because I don't trust you to stay out of trouble, and you'd be gone before Bentley or Murray could catch you." Sly paused. "No offense, guys."

"None taken!" Murray called back.

Lady sighed. A brown glove and an arm covered in an ivory shirt extended out of the van expectantly.

Rolling his eyes, Sly reluctantly took it and helped her step out.

Lady delicately stepped out of the van to stand beside him, tossing her braid over her shoulder and brushing at her green tunic like a fine lady would a skirt. Another raccoon, her fur was a series of pale blondes—the mark of an albino. Curiously though, she wore a white masquerade mask decorated in gold designs and amethyst insets that completely hid her face. Whereas Sly was in his prime, Lady was in the cusps of youth in her late teens. She moved with a deceptive, elegant grace, and seemed to enjoy staying too close in Sly's personal bubble.

She also carried a Cooper cane, despite having no familial ties to the Clan. How remained a little mystery she refused to divulge to the gang.

Her head twisted from side to side, taking in her surroundings. "I smell salt water," she said in disbelief. Lady was also the only member of the ragtag group who still disbelieved in time travel.

"Karin Coopergiwa lived in a small, seaside village," Bentley rattled off from inside the van, staring at a computer screen. "Her childhood home was further inland—"

"Coopergiwa Karin," Lady interrupted.

"What?" Bentley squawked in obvious offense.

Lady shrugged, waving one hand absently. "Japanese names go surname first, _cher_. And unless ya'll already got permission, she's Coopergiwa, not Karin." She over pronounced the ancestor's first name as well, so rather than it sounding like the English name Karen, like Bentley was saying, it was more like "kah-reen."

Sly was a little skeptical. Rioichi had never corrected any of them. But then, there was also the question as to how a ninja and sushi chef had learned English in the first place. He had never thought to ask his Japanese ancestor, and it was too late now. Hopefully this even more backdated _ancestress_ would speak it as well. If not, it seemed his tentative ally knew something about Japan.

Shaking his head, Sly grabbed Lady's wrist before Bentley could go into full, insulted genius mode. "We'll look through the village for where she is living now," he said firmly. He could only hope they'd find Karin Coopergiwa—before Bentley and Lady killed each other.

* * *

Lady was still living in the land of logical disbelief. She hadn't bought into this time travel business at all. There were other explanations for what she had seen so far. Bamboo was grown outside of Asia nowadays, and they easily could have knocked her out until they reached the coast of France.

She just wasn't sure of the _point_. Why con her into believing their time travel malarkey? What was the end game? There was _always_ an end game. She just couldn't put her finger on it.

Using the cover of bamboo, the two raccoons scaled a tree and kept among the branches. Lady didn't even know where they were going until she almost ran straight into Sly. "Problem, sugah?" she asked as she found a safe perch on another branch.

He gave her a slight, cocky smile. "Just deciding where to start," he said, gesturing in front of him. Lady obliged him and took a glance. She about fell out of the tree, only catching herself with a steadying hand on the trunk.

A small seaside village spread out in front of them in a dip between hills. Fields flooded for rice, small huts with bamboo mats for doors. The small harbor was filled with shipping boats. A fancier house was set in the middle of town—the headman's house, if Lady were to guess. It was the very image of a feudal, Asian town.

" _Nous_ … We…" Lady stammered a little, belatedly switching from French to English in her shock.

"Yep," Sly said with a slightly smug smirk, leaning against the tree trunk just to pose rather than to keep a solid grip on reality like her. "Time travel. It's real." He leaned down and over, pressing underneath her mask on her real chin to force her mouth closed, sensing somehow that it was hanging open. "Now, can we find my ancestress?"

She clicked her teeth shut. Oh, she couldn't leave them like this. Behind her mask, Lady smiled a sweet, vindictive, Southern Belle smile. Twisting her cane, she whacked Sly upside the head. "Don' be an ass," she said tartly, taking a little bit of joy in his hiss of pain. She left him to catch up with her as she started for the town. Surely someone would know where Coopergiwa lived.

* * *

Sly carefully walked on the rope stretched over several of the small huts, his tail whipping along behind him for balance. It was weird to adjust to a second weight on the wire. He hadn't been with a partner who could do what he did since he was first training as a thief under his parents. But Lady was right behind him, and he refused to just leave her somewhere. She was too much trouble to leave wandering around.

Especially in this environment. Sly stopped in the middle of the rope as a bear warrior walked under them in an ambling patrol. It wasn't the first they had seen, either. They were all less heavily armored than the boar _samurai_ Sly saw last time he was in Japan. Poorer, less quality. And not all of them liked each other, as judged by one of them spitting at their companions. It was a mix of bears and salamanders… Sly didn't like sharing the roofs with the lizards, but the idea of facing off against another bear without Murray around was even scarier.

A housewife—a serow—came outside to check her clothesline, only to shriek. All her clean clothes were in the mud, ruining her day's work. Grabbing one article, she stalked off for the same warrior that has just walked under Sly.

"Sugah?"

"Shh," Sly hissed. "I want to hear this." His thief instincts were tingling that this was important, somehow. Lady huffed, but stayed still.

"Look at this!" the grey and black goat scolded, shaking the garment right under the warrior's nose. For a villager, she showed little fear. "Again! Are you not supposed to be watching for that Coopergiwa sow and her brats? Then why are these tiresome pranks still happening?"

The warrior sneered, slapping the muddy cloth away from him. "Look, doe. You were told to keep anything of value inside, or it was your risk."

"Then how are we supposed to live our lives?" she snapped, putting her hands on her hips. She ignored the mud now streaking her own apron and clothes. "You should be out at that cursed compound of hers, the one south of town. Not here!"

"Take it up with your headman," he dismissed her. "Something about no real proof, and not daring to bring in the daughter of a _samurai_ without real evidence against her." He turned to resume his patrol.

"She gave up special treatment when she married a merchant and not in her own class!" the woman cried, chasing after him. "And what about my laundry?"

Sly turned his head to look over his shoulder at Lady. "Well, we know where she is."

Lady's ears laid back, almost flat against her skull. "Sounds like she might be in a bit of trouble among the neighbors, though. We sure about this?"

"Depends." Sly finished crossing the roof with a casual jump. He immediately whipped around, resting his foot on the end and blocking her path to do the same. The male raccoon crossed his arms. "You want to risk going back to our time and facing more assassination attempts?" He decided he owed her some of her own sass back and raised one brow at her.

She stared at him, possibly making an expression behind that mask. He smirked a little…and missed the swing of her hook, grabbing his ankles and knocking them out from underneath him. The male thief landed on the thatch roof with a huffing grunt. To add to his indignity, Lady used him as a little bridge to get up and over to the next roof ahead of him. Swearing, Sly scrambled back up to his feet and took off after her. At least she was going in the right direction…

* * *

The compound was far more impressive than the village huts. Shoji screens served as the doors out on to the wrap around porch. Heavy wood served as the other walls, and the roof was shingled with more wood. It was set around the foot of a mountain, leaving Sly to assume it had an irregular shape. There _was_ a second floor, with all the windows curiously thrown open.

Karin had done something curious in her hideout's layout, though. Normally, Cooper HQs were hidden, with easy exits and entrances. But this compound had been set, either by nature or by creation, far away from the tree lines and other foliage for at least twenty feet. Even the garden set in the curve of the house wasn't helpful, being a rock garden meant for meditation rather than growing anything.

Sly could _not_ see an easy approach. He scowled and gestured to Lady. She slinked closer, leaning on his shoulder. His scowl deepened. That wasn't what he intended for her to do. Sly put it aside to discuss later. "Circle around and see if there's a back way in," he ordered.

"Bossy, bossy," she chided, flicking his nose with her tail. But she did stalk off to the side with a brief rustle of bamboo.

For a moment, Sly wondered if letting her out of his sight was a good idea. Echoing his feelings, Bentley chimed in over his earpiece, "Are you sure it's a good idea to send her on her own, Sly?"

Strangely, Bentley's doubt erased Sly's. "It's not like she can go anywhere," he pointed out reasonably. "And if she gets in trouble, it shouldn't be any more of a hassle to get her out of it."

"But Sly—"

"Ya'll know I can hear yah, right?" Lady's voice crackled over the earpiece. Belated, Sly remembered that Bentley had set one in her ear before they had left modern Paris.

Bentley sniffed. "Don't you have something else to do besides eavesdropping?"

"I ain't droppin' no eaves!" she protested. "Ya'll are natterin' in my ear!"

"What have you pulled out of the Thievius Raccoonus about Karin?" Sly interrupted the quarrel before it could escalate.

Bentley grumbled, staying quiet for a second too long.

"Bentley…?" Sly drawled in warning.

"Well…" the turtle stalled a little longer, and then finally gave up. "There isn't much in her section at all. I mean, there _is_ a section, mostly a history and then a description of her coin magnetism technique, but once I translated all of the old kanji, there just… isn't much here."

Sly frowned. That was odd. Usually, the Raccoonus was thorough, sometimes amazingly so, about each of the ancestors. For there to be little detail concerning the attempt on one of their lives, well, it was more than a little strange. But his brain caught up with him at last. He hadn't excelled at history, but he knew the basics. Including the fact it was highly likely that Karin wasn't able to write herself. Most women weren't educated, if he remembered right, especially at this time. So it was most likely a son or maybe even grandson recording after the fact. And the Raccoonus was a merging of several different branches of the family—it could be something didn't make it over from the Japanese script.

"Just keep looking," he said instead of voicing those thoughts, "Check the physical book instead of just scans." He barely heard Bentley agree. Sly began inching his way through the forest, doing his own casing of the Coopergiwa compound. Maybe if he could count bodies… He didn't see any guards, and it was impossible for them to have anything like Bentley's high tech security systems. It should be easy as pie to get in, find Karin, and introduce himself before she had time to even raise her fur.

There was one set of lights on, but he couldn't see a good silhouette to know who was in there. He dared to leave the safety of the depths of the foliage to the very edge of the tree line. There was definitely something moving, but it looked tiny, barely Bentley's size…

He was hit from behind.

Sly tried to roll with the force of it, but his opponent tangled his weapon in Sly's feet. He hit the ground—hard—and lost his breath. And his cane. He had to give this mysterious attacker credit. Sly couldn't even see him against the dark of the trees and night sky. He kicked out with his hind feet anyway, preventing him from getting pinned. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the bronze of his cane. Rolling before his mysterious opponent could take up the attack again, he scrambled to get a grip on the cane.

His hands were barely wrapped around the familiar wood before a blade pressed against the side of his throat—a real threat this time. Sly froze rather than risk getting his head chopped off. The one holding that blade chattered something at him in a hiss he didn't understand. He couldn't even tell if it was male or female. "Um… English please?" he asked, crossing his fingers and praying that they even spoke it.

There was a long, dreadful pause. And then… "What are you doing sneaking outside my home?" a voice carefully asked. This time, under the thick accent, Sly could tell it was female.

"Ka—Coopergiwa," he said, correcting himself just in case. Trust his luck that his ancestress would find him before he could talk to her. "Look, I can explain."

"Speak," she ordered, pressing the blade tighter against Sly's skin.

"I'm your cousin," he said quickly. "A…very distant cousin, but a cousin." Sort of… Sly wasn't entirely sure how far back his relation went to Rioichi, or even which side of the family it was. For all he knew, he was descended from the European Coopers and wasn't related much at all to the ones here in Japan.

"You are lying," Karin said factually, dashing any hopes he had. "If you were any relation of mine, you would be able to lie better."

"He _is_ awful, but in his defense, _chere_ , he did have to figure out his family business without the family part," a more familiar voice added to the conversation.

Sly closed his eyes and couldn't help but whimper quietly. He wanted to bang his head against something, but didn't dare with the blade where it was. "Lady. Not. Helping," he managed to grit at her from between his teeth.

The albino appeared in front of him, swinging her cane in a lazy circle. "Awww, did poor little Sly-ikins get caught?" she cooed at him like he was a toddler. "Yah should've gone the direct way for once, Cooper."

He growled, but didn't try to comment on it right now. He'd strangle her later. Meanwhile, Karin's blade moved a little away from Sly's neck, no longer putting pressure there. "Cooper?" she repeated, her accent adding a soft _ah_ sound after the r.

If the strange pronunciation threw Lady off, she didn't physically show it in a way Sly could see. She set her cane down on the ground, leaning on it casually. "Yep," she said. "Well, he is anyway. I'm of a different family. Doubt you'd have heard of them, ain't that important." She paused and then added, "Yah know, I can understand wantin' to kill him, I really can, but yah think yah could give him a more dignified death?"

Sly felt the pressure at his throat leave, and finally managed to pull himself up to his feet. "Thanks," he said sarcastically to the blonde, before turning to look at his ancestress.

Coopergiwa Karin was a good deal like a female Rioichi, he supposed. Her fur was the same russet-brown, just lighter, and she had the same golden eyes. Rather than the _kimono_ he was expecting, she was in the special wrap shirt and billowy pants that Sly had learned were called a _haori_ and _hakama_ , the top in pale lilac and the lower darker of the same hue. Her mask was the same dark purple, tied around her hair, which was severely parted down the middle and then folded in a bun at the back of her head. The blade she'd been holding at Sly's throat was her actual Cooper cane, hers some kind of fancy glaive, the blade made of bronze and the shaft a darkly stained wood that had various nicks from blocking other weapons.

She was between Lady and Sly in height, the top of her head about even with Sly's nose.

It was soft pressure under his jaw that alerted him to the fact that his jaw was hanging open. He snapped it shut and managed a half-hearted glare at Lady. She tweaked his nose before lowering her hand from where she had shut his mouth for him. "Is that blush for me, sugah?" she asked, leaning into the curve of his body.

Sly held his body completely stiff, though inside he was swearing. "No," he told her hotly. He didn't want to admit why he was flushing, but he grumbled anyway, " _She_ beat me." It was embarrassing. He'd thought he was doing so well, especially with Egypt making him all sorts of paranoid.

Lady snorted, interrupting his pity party. "Sugah, _I_ beat yah, and I might point out I'm both shorter than you _and_ younger. At least you can put her sneaking up on yah on the fact she has more experience than yah… I think." She eyed Karin. "Yer age is hard to guess. Congrats on that, by the by."

Karin's stern face couldn't completely suppress the twitch of her lips, indicating she was trying not to laugh. "I am twenty-six winters," she answered placidly.

"There yah go, she's two years older, and apparently it makes a world of difference," Lady said with a firm nod.

His brain finally untangled what Lady was talking about. "When did _you_ beat me?" he demanded, pride stung. She was some young snit of a thing. There was no way she had beaten him.

Lady held her fisted hand up to where it was right in front Sly's nose. His instinct was to jerk back, but he had a feeling that's what she wanted. He instead focused on seeing the brown-gloved hand without appearing crossed eyed.

She unbent one finger in front of him. "The night we first met," she listed, then raised another finger. "The night yer ex decided to shoot at us, seein' as I don' think yah noticed me leavin'."

Sly had ignored the first one (since she was right), and swore the second time. No, he hadn't. He'd been too busy arguing with Carmelita. "She isn't my ex," he argued instead.

The blonde didn't take the bait. She raised a third finger. "The night of the ballet, since neither yah or _Monsieur_ Bossy Shell could sneak in a camera on yer ownsomes."

"And then you had to be saved when someone tried to kidnap you," Sly interjected.

"Because they wanted to keep us from breedin', which again, yer fault." Lady held up another finger. "The ballet again, or did yah forget that yer little fox friend decided to try and make a scene?" Sly didn't have a response to that one. Lady _had_ defused the situation, especially after Carmelita slapped him for daring to show up with a date, despite turning him down to come with him. "And let's not forget on the way here when you decided to sass me." She raised the last finger on her hand.

"You sass me all the time!" Sly protested. "What, you can dish it out but you can't take it?"

Lady snorted again. "Sugah, I sass _everyone_. Yer the one who takes it all personal-like."

"Are you certain the two of you are not married?"

Karin's interruption killed Sly's response before he could think of it. The two modern-day raccoon thieves looked to the Japanese noble, who appeared mildly amused, and then at each other. Lady and Sly quickly took several steps away from each other, pointedly facing opposite directions. "I have a girlfriend," Sly quickly explained.

"Couldn' make me marry a Cooper with a knife to my throat," Lady said, equally derisive.

Before _that_ could start another fight, Karin touched Sly on the shoulder. "Very well then. Any Cooper is a relation of mine," she said with a small smile. "Even if the relation is by marriage. Come, you must meet your other cousins."

 _By marriage?_ Sly was mentally sputtering, but he quickly followed the two female raccoons in the direction of the manor. He grabbed them both by the elbows. When Lady tilted her head to the side, he said simply, "Murray and Bentley."

"Thanks for finally remembering us," the turtle grumbled over the ear pieces.

Lady whined, throwing her head back. "Fine, let's go get them," she said with a sigh. "I'm guessing the van is coming too?"

Sly looked to Karin. She was frowning a little. "What is a…van?" she repeated the word awkwardly, once again a vowel sound after the end of the word, this time an _eh_ sound.

"A horseless cart," Sly quickly thought of a decent explanation. "One that is probably best kept out of sight."

* * *

"Well, what were yah expectin'?" Lady hissed at him as they waited at the front door. Bentley and Murray were still situating the van in its new hiding place in the small vegetable garden hidden between the house and the mountain, leaving the two raccoons to meet the family first, as it were.

"I don't know, but not this," Sly whispered back. Karin was walking in front of them, carefully navigating a floor to get inside through a side door so she could open the front door for them. He had explained to Lady how he hadn't been expecting Karin to be married into the Cooper family, rather than the name "Cooper" being taken from her name by her descendants, on the drive back, Karin leading the way down several side roads. "I mean, Rioichi's time isn't too far from now, and he's a Cooper. And he had her coin magnet. I just assumed…"

"Yah know what they say about assumin' things, Cooper," Lady scolded, though her face was still facing towards Karin. "At least we found her inside instead of bein' caught sneakin' in here."

"What makes you think we would have been caught?" Sly asked indignantly.

Lady gestured to the floor in front of her. "Notice how there ain't a single board even creakin'?" she asked rhetorically, just as Karin very carefully balanced on her feet and slid open the screen, ducking inside. "She isn't worried about makin' a single squeak or groan. I'd bet yah good money that those are nightingale floors."

"Nightingale floors?" Sly repeated in confusion.

There was a slight thump beside them, and then the screen there opened, revealing Karin, just now minus the dark leather ankle boots her _hakama_ had been tucked into. " _Hai_ , Sly _-san_ ," she said politely, stepping out of the way so they could enter her home. "Your companion is correct. Outside of the front and back doors, all entrances have nightingale floors in front of them."

Sly and Lady entered the house. At first, he noticed the crisp smell of herbs keeping the stale air fresh, as well as the smell of the lanterns hanging from the roof, very dimly lighting the way. The first room was a pounded ground floor under a straw mat, with a basket holding a few parasols and hooks holding cloaks along one of the walls. There was a high step up on to the wooden floors of the house hallway. Sly almost walked straight in, until Lady poked him in the back with her cane. He turned around in annoyance, and saw her taking off her own boots to set next to what were obviously Karin's, alongside a handful of other shoes that Sly didn't take the time to count. He quickly slipped off his own to put there as well.

If Karin noticed his almost-faux-pas, she ignored it. She had already stepped up on to the smooth floor, and continued her explanation, "They are designed to make noise if someone puts weight on them aside from very small, key pressure points. It sounds similar to their namesake bird's chirping."

Sly nodded, and could feel his ears getting warmed as he flushed again. So much for there being no security systems in this era…

Once the two other raccoons joined her in the hallway, Karin slid open another screen. Instantly, Sly could taste the fresh air, and noticed that this was the room the side door she had opened outside led into. It was a simple Japanese sitting room, with a low table in the center of the room and surrounded by soft pillows to sit on. _Tatami_ mats covered the floor rather than hard wood, and a lantern hung from the ceiling, though it was currently dark.

Karin changed that first. She grabbed a nearby pole and used it to lower the lamp down to where she could comfortably light it, filling the room with its warm, golden glow before she raised it back up to hang over the table. "There," she said. "That is better. I will leave the door to the porch open so your friends can find you and I can bolt the front door shut again." She turned back to them, lost in thought for a moment, before reaching a decision. "My kits and husband should all still be up. It would be best if they meet you now and then go to bed, rather than wait till morning. My son can be…impetuous."

She didn't wait to hear their response, quickly darting out of the room and shutting the door behind her. Sly was left standing in the middle of the room, turned towards the door as he tried to process all of that. He was starting to miss being on his own…

Sly heard the wooden thump again—the bolt, he assumed—and then nothing.

"Who is Rioichi, anyway?" Lady asked. He turned and fought down the urge to be amused. She had perched herself on the floor, rolled on her stomach with her chest and chin on one of the pillows. It was not how they were supposed to be used, but then, he imagined Lady couldn't stand to be conventional. He couldn't help noticing that her cane was lying next to her, still in very easy reach. She let him finish appraisal before adding, "Another ancestor, I'm guessin'?"

He nodded, finally moving himself. Sly sat on a cushion in a more conventional manner, folding his legs underneath him and stretching his cane along his lap. "He was a ninja," he explained, deciding to keep to the bare basics. She didn't deserve the full story. "That spire hopping move you are trying to learn just by watching me? He invented that. It's one of the greatest moves in our history." He glared at her. "So quit trying to steal it."

"Might as well ask me to stop breathin' too," she quipped back.

Sly opened his mouth, but was cut off by possibly the most _obnoxious_ squeaking he'd ever heard in his life. Jerking his head up, he saw that Murray was standing in the open doorway, looking down at the floor underneath his feet in absolute puzzlement. Sly's immediate thought came out of his mouth before he could think about it, " _That_ is what is supposed to resemble the chirping of a nightingale?"

"Well, the _uguisu_ at least," Lady said in amusement. "They have pretty songs, but yes, their chirpin' can get a little annoyin'."

"The ugi-what?" Murray said, thankfully asking it so Sly didn't have to.

"Japanese Wabler," Bentley said, though he was eyeing Lady speculatively. Adjusting his glasses, he added, "Though I would be curious where the Cajun Lady Masque learned of them by their Japanese name, not to mention all the other tidbits of Japanese culture she seems to have at her disposal."

Lady shrugged, turning her head so she could face Bentley. "My old teacher brought in a friend of hers once to teach me Japanese manners, should I ever find myself needin' them."

"A friend?" Sly raised one brow. Was he reading too much into that (showing that Lady was already corrupting him), or was she not saying something?

Humming a non-answer, Lady laid her head down on the pillow. "I know it's still an hour 'fore dawn, but I'm gettin' tired," she complained with a yawn that Sly could tell was sincere. "Time travel wears yah out, huh?"

Sly snorted. "You have no idea."

The door didn't so much slide open as it did clatter as one _very_ excited little raccoon kit darted into the room. "Can't catch me, can't catch me!" he taunted, his thin little tail that hadn't really had a chance to grow in yet waving behind him like a banner. His English was much better than Karin's. "Can't catch me! I'm the ninja master!"

He couldn't be more than six, Sly guessed. The little squirt was barely the same size as Bentley. That had to have been what Sly saw bouncing around in the rooms before Karin nabbed him. He was darker than Karin though still the russet brown rather than grey like Sly, with her honey eyes and dressed in a plain, undyed cotton _yukata_ that came only to his knees. His hair was short, barely long enough to be pulled into a short ponytail at the top of his head.

And Sly knew exactly how klutzy little raccoon kits could be. He'd gotten into more than his fair share of scrapes. Someone had to make the kit stop running around like that. Using his cane, Sly snagged him by the waist.

Lady saw what he was doing, and straightened up to sit on the cushion properly, though she tucked her feet neatly underneath her in a more lady-like style. Sly took the unspoken invitation and very gently swung the little brat into her lap, where she quickly wrapped her arms around him before he could squirm away.

"Awwww, no fair, no fair!" he yelped, pouting in protest. He directed big, pleading eyes up to his captor first, only to curl up a little. "Scary…" he whispered, his tail tucking up between his legs a little.

"A big, brave raccoon like you, scared of a little mask?" Lady quipped back.

The kit's tail immediately bottle-brushed and he straightened up in his hold. "'m not scared!" he protested. "Don't say that!" He tilted his head back down to glare at Sly, as if daring him to argue that he was indeed scared.

Finally seeing the kit still, Sly bit the inside of his cheek to keep from swearing. "Rioichi?" he managed to say incredulously.

* * *

 ** _Masque_ —French, mask**  
 ** _cher(e)_ —French, dear**  
 ** _samurai—_ Japanese, an elite type of warrior and swordsman, they were trained within specific families**  
 ** _kimono_ —Japanese, robe-like garment (women), traditional clothing with varying rules and formality depending on situation, class, marital status, and season**  
 ** _haori_ —Japanese, traditional shirt**  
 ** _hakama_ —Japanese, traditional pants**  
 ** _Monseiur_ —French, Mister/Master, formal title for a man**  
 ** _hai_ —Japanese, yes**  
 **- _san_ —Japanese, Japanese, Mister/Miss/Missus, everyday level title for a person (gender neutral)**  
 ** _tatami_ —Japanese, a particular style of grass weaving, mats in this style are traditional floor coverings**  
 ** _uguisu_ —Japanese, native name for the Japanese Wabler**  
 ** _yukata_ —Japanese, a light weight robe garment (unisex), used as traditional summer festival clothing, bathing, or sleeping**

 **Pictures of Karin and our enemy are available on my deviant art account.**


	2. The Trouble with Kits

**The Trouble with Kits**

* * *

 _ **Previously:** Finally seeing the kit still, Sly bit the inside of his cheek to keep from swearing. "Rioichi?" he managed to say incredulously._

"That's me. How'd you know that?" the kit asked, leaning forward as much as Lady's hold around his waist would let him.

Sly's words failed him. Unfortunately, Lady's did not. "Wait…" She looked down at the bundle of trouble in her lap, equally disbelieving if her tone indicated anything. "This kit is the one who invents that fancy spire jumpin' trick of yers?"

Laying his ears back, Sly slouched a little, crossing his arms. "He grows up," he said defensively.

Lady rolled her eyes, putting her whole head in the motion so it was clear what exactly she was doing. "Time travel," she practically spat the words, her disgust obvious.

Rioichi squirmed in her lap. "Let go," he said demandingly, only to squeal. Sly eyed Lady, not sure what she did to earn that noise.

She ignored both males' looks, acting like Rioichi hadn't uttered a peep since Sly said his name. "What?" she asked innocently.

Sly snorted. "Peddle that elsewhere, I'm not buying it," he jeered at her. She snorted back at him, and rearranged Rioichi in her arms when he tried to make a bolt for it.

"I congratulate you, Lady- _san_ ," Karin's mellow voice came from the door.

Turning his head to look, Sly saw that she had two little girls, easily the same age as Rioichi, balanced on each hip. They at least looked tuckered out and quite ready to be in bed. Both had the same, lighter russet coat as their mother, and both had their hair pulled out of their faces with white paper ribbons at the nape of their necks, the little bit left hanging down to the middle of their backs. The only visible difference between them was one had a blue sash around her waist, the other red.

"Congratulate?" Lady repeated.

Karin smiled. "My son is not the easiest kit to catch for bed time. Let me put these two down and I can take him from you. My husband appears to have fallen asleep in his workshop again."

"No need, I've got him," Lady assured her, standing up. And true to her word, despite his squirming, Rioichi stayed caught. Sly knew what that meant from his own childhood. The female raccoon had experience with children. She followed Karin deeper into the house, carrying the whining kit with her. Since both females had their hands full, the door just stayed open.

Shaking his head, Sly reached up and rubbed the corner of his eyes. He was starting to feel the fact he hadn't even gotten one of his brief spurts of sleep in a while. Time to find a distraction. "Any luck with the Raccoonus, Bentley?" he asked, finding a problem that hadn't been dealt with.

"I'm afraid not," the turtle adjusted his glasses. "I've found the original kanji from when the section was added into the book, but it's slow for me to translate it. Japanese is not one of my more proficient languages, and it is made complicated by the age."

"Keep trying," was the only advice that Sly had for him. He tried to think of something, anything that he was forgetting. Really, everything else was going to require Karin to explain more about what was currently going on before they—meaning Bentley—could make a plan about where they needed to start poking their noses. The muscles in his lower jaw tensed, and it took all of Sly's attention to keep from yawning, even clenching his eyes shut. He didn't even notice when his eyes became too heavy to open more than halfway, and he couldn't keep his head up anymore. All he saw was what he thought was the moon, which made no sense, he was inside.

And then Sly Cooper was out like a light.

* * *

Lady caught Sly as he started to lean, lowering his shoulders to the floor. By the time his head was in her lap, he had already curled up like the kits had as soon as she and Karin had gotten them into their futons. She took off his hat and put it down next to her, unable to stop her snort at the awful hat hair she saw that it had been hiding. It and his staff would be in easy reach without making sleep uncomfortable for him.

She threw Bentley the capsule from the sleep dart she had stolen from his chair back in the van. She'd been hanging onto it since she'd gotten dragged along on this little adventure. At first, she'd planned on using it in some sort of escape attempt. That plan was gone as soon as she saw actual time travel was involved. (As science-fiction as _that_ sounded, even in her head.)

But then she'd seen Cooper fighting a losing battle with exhaustion, one that she had picked up even that night at the ballet. And if some of his resulting crankiness was from that, well, far be it for her to not help.

Bentley stared at the dart in his hand in horror and then back to her. "What did you _do?"_ he said, just short of wailing. "When did you _get_ this? When did you get into the _room?"_

Barely, Lady refrained from snorting again. Apparently, Sly was the eyes, ears, and the sneaky side of this operation they had going. "I made the stupid male go to sleep like he obviously needed, back at the van when you were busy with the time machine, and right when stupid here was tryin' not to yawn."

As if he knew she was talking about him, Sly muttered in his sleep. Absently, Lady reached down and ran her fingers through his hair to sooth him and keep him asleep. The turtle was reaching for an inhaler, making her want to laugh, though she didn't quite dare.

"You might be sneakier than Sly!" Murray said in obvious awe.

Lady wrinkled her nose, even though she knew the hippo couldn't see it behind her mask. She wasn't sure if being able to sneak on them when their main thief was half-asleep counted as being sneakier than the last of the Cooper clan. But she would take the compliment, and preened a little.

Karin came into the room with the bedding that she had been gathering while Lady went on ahead. She paused for a moment, a slight smile trying to tug at her otherwise stern face, and then started to throw blankets and mats around. "You may sleep here until our type of morning," she said, keeping her voice down.

"I'll be stayin' up later, Coopergiwa- _san_ ," Lady said, looking down at her currently occupied lap and then back up at Karin.

"Are you certain you will not need rest?" the Japanese noblewoman asked, her brow furrowed over her violet mask.

"One all-nighter won' kill me," Lady promised, gathering her tail around her and Sly as an impromptu cover for his shoulders and her legs and feet.

Giving a slight snort, Karin grabbed a quilt from the pile that Murray was now sorting through to figure out his and Bentley's bedding and threw it over Sly. "Wait here," she ordered and left again.

Lady bit her lower lip to keep from laughing. She may have made Sly eat dirt, but apparently once she knew they were allies, Karin started mothering them all. The older female wasn't gone long, returning with something folded up. "Arms," she said firmly.

Agreeable for now, Lady extended her arms out. Unfolding the fabric, Karin revealed it to be the heavy fabric of a _karaginu_ , the outermost layer of the most formal of _kimono_. It was only hip length, but that was long enough since Karin was taller than Lady and the garment was made perfect for the real noblewoman. Lady made a sound of protest, but Karin ignored it, slipping the silk up and on to Lady's shoulders. It was double-lined and heavy, and the sleeves were long enough that Lady's arms would be warm. "Thank you," Lady said softly, arranging the fabric around her so it wouldn't wrinkle.

Karin gave another snort. "I should be thanking you. You are looking after my young cousin, after all." There was a slight twinkle in her eye, hinting that it was more out of amusement than anything else that she was helping. She reached up and blew out the lantern, closing all the doors to insure that everyone would stay warm. Bentley was in his chair with a quilt to help him sleep, while Murray had needed every other bit of bedding possible, the quilts meant for slim raccoons rather than a hippo. He'd ended up layering them over him so it took three quilts to cover him completely. They both seemed content, though. Bentley made the occasional whistle, and Murray was quickly snoring.

Shaking her head, she looked down at the head in her lap. "How do yah sleep through this racket all the time, sugah?" she asked rhetorically.

But Sly stirred, making a distressed sound in the back of his throat. A nightmare, if she were to guess.

Lady mentally scrambled, trying to think what to do. Combing her fingers through his hair didn't work this time, even when she took off her gloves. She bit her lower lip and tried to remember what her mother would do in these situations. It was potentially embarrassing, but as long as she didn't wake the other two, it would fine…right?

She reviewed the last musical she had seen on Broadway, and found an appropriate song. "I don't know if You can hear me… Or if You're even there… I don't know if You would listen to a gypsy's prayer…" she sang, keeping her voice soft. And as she sang a song about outcasts deserving mercy, even if only from God, Sly eased back into an easy slumber. Mentally, Lady resigned herself to a long day. At least the screens would let in enough light to keep her from dozing off…

* * *

Lady's head jerked up as the screen leading to the main part of the house slid open. A little head poked in, and it took Lady a second to see the subtle (very, _very_ subtle) differences to recognize it as the oldest of Karin's kits, Kaya. Today, her hair was still pulled back by a plain white ribbon, but she was dressed in a child's _yukata_ of rust orange flowers on pale blue and an orange _obi_. She made wide eyes at Lady and then looked to the others before back at her.

Holding her finger up over where her mask's mouth was, she pointed at Murray and then at Bentley. Nodding her head, Kaya poked her head back out and then was back inside in a flash. Right behind her was her sister and middle child, Kiyo, looking nearly identical to her sister except her _yukata_ colors were reversed—pale blue flowers and _obi_ over rust. Kaya woke up Murray, while Kiyo went for Bentley. The girls were gentle, gentler than Lady would have been. The hippo and turtle yawned as they woke up, causing both little girls to shush them and then point to where Sly was still snoozing, his head in Lady's lap.

Bentley scowled, but Lady wasn't having any of it. She rested her hands protectively on his head, silently daring Bentley to _try_ wake the male raccoon before his body was ready. Only her tail twitched as she stared him down.

She suspected it was her mask that scared him into silence. She wasn't that intimidating, if it weren't for the blank porcelain face that gave no clue to her expression. But the turtle fiddled with his glasses and adjusted himself in his wheelchair. The girls gestured for the boys to follow them. Feeling spiteful, Lady twiddled her fingers after them.

The two girls weren't gone for long. They came back, carefully balancing a tray between them. They set it down where Lady could easily reach each of the items—rice, _miso_ soup, broiled mackerel, _umeboshi,_ and there was a little pot with steam coming out of the spout and two cups. No doubt it contained green tea, which thrilled Lady half-to-death. If she couldn't have a cup of strong chicory coffee, she'd take hot green tea, if she had her druthers.

She gave the best bow she could with a full lap, and the girls returned it. " _Haha-ue_ said she'll send a fresh pot every hour," Kaya whispered. "And a tray for Sly- _san_ , once he wakes up."

"What hour is it now?" Lady asked.

"Half until Rooster," Kiyo provided promptly.

That took Lady a minute to figure out. Feudal Japan used a temporal time system, with six hours to a day and six hours at night, and then labeled each hour by an animal from the zodiac, starting with Rabbit at sunrise. That put Rooster at…sunset. Nodding her head, she patted the girls on the head. "Run along and help the boys where yah can," she told them and they took off, covering their hands to keep from giggling.

Rolling her eyes upward, Lady looked down at the still-snoozing Sly. Well, at least one of them got to sleep in this evening. Her mask took a little effort to undo, freeing her to actually be able to eat and drink. She carefully used the chopsticks to build a bowl she could snack on. She was skilled enough with them that she didn't have to worry about dropping a single grain of rice on the head currently cushioned in her lap.

She smiled a little around her first bite. If only Maiko- _sensei_ could see her now. The Japanese squirrel had been a friend of her mentor, both a _geisha_ and a lady thief. It had taken both of them to get Lady to where she was now in terms of manners and deportment. But she'd been interested in where Maiko was from, and that had resulted in Lady have a plethora of knowledge about Japan that was supposed to be moderately useless. Only now it was turning out to be quite the secret weapon…

* * *

Bentley fiddled with his tea cup in an effort to avoid finishing his breakfast. He wasn't quite able to eat the _miso_ soup that Karin had put down for them. He just couldn't stand the taste of it. Beside him, Murray was looking morosely down at his tray, since he'd eaten everything on it already. Maybe he should have warned Karin about the hippo's large appetite… There was still no sign of Karin's mysterious husband, or of Rioichi for that matter. The girls, though, had been waiting outside their room and pointed them in the direction of the kitchen before going about some errand or another.

The two girls darted back into the room just then, reaching up to tug on Karin's pant legs on either side. " _Haha_ , we told Lady- _san_ about the tea like we promised," the one with the orange belt said.

" _Arigato,_ Kaya- _tan_ ," Karin said, looking down at her daughter, though there wasn't really a smile on her face. "And for speaking English for our guests."

" _Haha, Haha_!" the other girl begged. "Can we please have a party? Pretty please? With tea and treats?"

"Hmm…" Karin hummed. "I am uncertain, Kiyo- _tan_. You have weapons practice to do still, and your other lessons."

"But those are lessons about being proper Coopergiwa ladies," the first girl, Kaya, said. Even Bentley recognized an honorific that meant "little" attached to the names Karin had said. "Shouldn't we be entertaining our guests?"

Uh oh. Bentley quickly put down his tea cup. "Karin," he said, only to gulp at the sharp look that the raccoon gave him. Uh oh again. As loathe as he was to listen to Lady, he couldn't risk offending their hostess. "My apologies. Coopergiwa- _san_ ," he corrected himself. She gave him a tense nod for him to continue. "We have our own business to see to in the town, when Sly wakes up." The reminder of their missing member just made the turtle all the crankier. "When that… _female_ …lets us wake him up," he corrected himself under his breath.

"Hmm," Karin hummed. "One who waits patiently will catch a big fish, Bentley- _san."_

"What do fish have to do with anything?" he asked, adjusting his glasses.

"Old proverb. One my father-in-law is trying to teach my son," Karin said. Now there was a slight smile on her face. "In any case, I agree with Lady-s _an_. Let Sly sleep. What business must wait for my young cousin to wake?"

"Well, Sly is usually the one who takes photos—instant paintings, I guess you could say—of things around the town so we know the conditions to make a plan."

Karin turned around from whatever she was fiddling with at her hearth. "I see," she said, tilting her head. "But he is not always the one? You said usually."

Trust a Cooper to notice that one. "Well… There was this one time where I had to do it…" Bentley admitted.

"Then you can do so again," Karin said with a firm nod of her head.

"But I don't have anything _near_ Sly's skillset at getting around without all those warriors noticing me!" he protested.

Karin looked between Bentley and Murray. "I suppose you are lacking in one who has a certain…flexibility."

" _Haha_ , what's going on…?" a sleepy voice asked from the door. There was Rioichi, looking sleepy with his tail in the grasp of one of his arms and hair rumbled and loose, still in his sleeping _yukata_. He rubbed at his eye with his free hand and yawned.

Now a smile crossed Coopergiwa's face that was enough to set the hair on the back of Bentley's hair standing straight up…if he had any hair. It promised trouble. "You are going to go on an adventure with Bentley- _san_ , Rioichi- _kun_ ," Karin said slowly, like she was thinking out an answer to a problem. "You are going to have to help him, since there are places he cannot reach and people cannot see you reach them. Do you understand?"

That seemed to wake Rioichi up. "Really?" he asked, his ears perking up. "An adventure?" Karin nodded. The raccoon kit squealed and ran out of the kitchen.

"Ka—Coopergiwa- _san_!" Bentley protested.

She ignored him completely. "And that will insure that you and your sister can have a _quiet_ party in your room," she said, not using a particular daughter's name. It didn't seem to matter, since they both squealed. "I can fix you up a tray of tea things, and I will see what we have for treats…"

" _Manjū, Haha_!" Kiyo pleaded.

"And _daifuku_!" piped up Kaya.

"And _dango_!" they said at the same time.

Karin held up her hand, calling for silence. "There is some _higashi_ left over from when your grandmother visited," she said, keeping her tone firm. "Anything else will be fixed if, and only if, I have the time."

Both girls looked suitably chastised. " _Hai, Haha-ue_ ," they said in unison, ducking their heads.

Karin shook her head and waved her hands at them. The two girls scurried off, covering their mouths to hide their giggles. Shaking her head, she worked on something else where Bentley couldn't see.

That was the only opening he was going to get. "Coopergiwa- _san_ , are you sure about letting Rioichi come with me?" he said nervously.

"It will be good for him." She turned back around, holding two curiously wrapped things in her hand. "And you," she added. There were two squeals from the hallway, and Karin raised her eyes up to the ceiling with a sigh.

Rioichi ran into the room and almost straight into the table in his hurry. "Ready, _Haha_ ," he said, tail twitching in his excitement and almost bouncing. He looked like he'd thrown his clothes on and run out the door in the same breath.

Karin snorted. "Pour a cup of tea," she ordered him.

"But—" One look from Karin was enough to make him snap his mouth shut. Rioichi hurriedly reached over and grabbed a cup, nearly having to stand on the table to reach and pour from the pot into it. He had just set it down when Karin pushed at his shoulders, forcing him to sit down. She set down what was in her hands in front of him—two rice balls—and then started fixing his rumbled appearance.

The kit whined at her fussing, but his mouth was too full to protest. "Do not eat so fast. You will choke," she reprimanded him as she tied his hair off.

Rioichi swallowed the last of his rice ball. " _Hai_ ," he said dutiful before rapidly draining his cup. "Now can we go?"

"Ask Bentley- _san_ if he is finished with his breakfast," Karin ordered, walking back to the hearth.

Bentley suddenly found himself subjected to big, big eyes and a quivering lower lip. "Are you ready to leave, Bentley- _san_?" the kit asked, his tail waving behind him furiously.

Looking down at his still-full soup bowl, Bentley tried not to whimper. He couldn't say no to that face, he just couldn't. "Yeah, I'm ready."

Rioichi whooped, jumping in the air. The next thing Bentley knew, he was being pushed from behind as the kit chattered at him, asking questions and not leaving the turtle room to answer them.

Shaking her head, Karin wiped her hands on a towel. "And that gets him out of my hair for a little while," she mused out loud.

Up until now, Murray had been quiet. He was used to being forgotten, and passed off as not-to-bright. But he was smarter than he was given credit for, and he'd seen something that even Bentley might have missed. "You really are worried about Sly, aren't you?" he said.

Karin blinked, looking at the hippo. "Why, yes," she admitted. "The boy was ambushed last night, something that should be impossible for a Cooper, even by another Cooper of similar experience such as I. This, along with Lady- _san_ 's actions, suggest that he is much exhausted physically. And I can see the damage to his soul." She rubbed the line of her nose. "I was a _miko_ , a priestess, for a time. Some of it stays with you."

Murray beamed. Finally, someone else who saw into the spiritual side of things! He too had seen Sly's spiritual state after the Egypt fiasco. Maybe here, with Karin and Murray to help, some of that could start healing.

"And besides, I think Lady- _san_ 's protectiveness and nurturing of my cousin is… sweet." Karin seemed a little flustered to admit that.

It took effort for Murray to keep from laughing. "I agree completely," he said…just as his stomach rumbled. He had the decency to flush.

Raising a brow, Karin offered him Bentley's untouched bowl of soup. It was a little bit to help his still empty stomach. While he slurped it down, she wiped down his tray and her own from earlier that morning before setting a tea set with... _three?_...cups on it. "Hmm," she hummed, looking towards the small room that Murray knew was her storage/pantry area from watching her fix up his and Bentley's breakfast. " _Higashi_ is fine, and I think I could make some _daifuku_ and _dango_ easily enough with what I have." She looked at the hippo. "And some _onigiri_ for you, hmm, Murray-san? I apologize, I was not aware you needed more for breakfast than one of my kind."

"I… You want me to help the girls with their tea party?" he said in surprise.

"I would appreciate an adult being with them," she agreed. "I have the garden to see to, and my husband practically lives in his workshop until I pry him out of it." She frowned a little. "Do you think you can handle them? They are not quite the handful as their brother is…"

He puffed out his chest proudly. "I'll have you know that the Murray is a highly skilled _geisha_. The Murray got mad skills."

Karin smiled. "Good. Perhaps you can teach my girls such etiquette and manners, as well as conversation tactics. I will admit, the last is not my specialty."

Murray was confused for a moment, until his little bit of history reared up. That's right, _geisha_ were performers but not as…risqué…during this time period as they had been when he pretended to be Madame Geisha. He smiled back at Karin. "Alright, so, what do you need me to do?" he asked eagerly.

* * *

Bentley was sitting in a safe alcove just outside the main fields for the village. "First I think I need pictures of what damage is currently being blamed on your mother," he said to his little companion.

"The big ones are a bunch of dams that are making irrigation to the fields bad, and some valuables that turned up stolen," Rioichi informed him, wrinkling his nose. "Though I think I know who really has those. He's a meanie."

Bentley hummed, rubbing his chin. "So pictures of each of the dams—"

"Are you going to draw the pictures, Bentley- _san_?"

"What, oh, no," he said, pulling out his binocucom. "You see, I hold this up to my eyes and can look through it at things, using these buttons to see closer, and if I hit this one, it will take a picture." He held it so Rioichi could see what each of the buttons were that he meant.

Rioichi craned his head over the wheelchair side. "So you need pictures of each of the dams?" he repeated. " _Hai_ , Bentley- _san_!" He snatched the binocucom from Bentley's hands.

"Wait!" Bentley cried out, but it was too late. Rioichi was already walking across the narrow paths of the dykes between fields. Too narrow for Bentley's chair, even if he hovered. "Oh dear," he murmured. What was he going to tell Karin if something happened to her son? He used his controls to start navigating the paths he _could_ , trying to keep the little ninja in sight…and not have a panic attack.

* * *

 ** _karaginu_ —Japanese, the outermost layer of the most formal of kimono**  
 ** _obi_ —Japanese, the belt part of kimono and yukata type garments**  
 ** _miso_ —Japanese, a paste made from fermented soybeans and barley or rice malt, common in Japanese cuisine**  
 ** _umeboshi_ —Japanese, pickled ume fruit (ume is commonly translated as plum in English, but in actuality, this fruit is more closely related to the apricot)**  
 ** _Haha/-ue_ —Japanese, Mother**  
 ** _-sensei_ —Japanese, teacher**  
 ** _geisha_ —Japanese, traditionally they are entertainers and courtesans, skilled in conversation, arts, music, and tea ceremony (the prostitution is a different thing, ya'll)**  
 ** _Arigato_ —Japanese, thank you**  
 ** _-tan_ —Japanese, title for female children**  
 ** _-kun_ —Japanese, title for males that indicates familiarity or a child**  
 ** _Manjū_ —Japanese, commonly called a Japanese steam cake, it's different types of fillings (such as sweetened red-bean paste) encased in a shell of flour, rice powder, and buckwheat**  
 ** _daifuki_ —Japanese, a small round of glutinous rice cake stuffed with sweet fillings (such as sweetened red-bean paste)**  
 ** _dango_ —Japanese, dumplings made of rice flour and sweetened served three or five on a skewer, sometimes with fillings, flavorings, or sauces**  
 ** _higashi_ —Japanese, types of Japanese treats that are dried and contain very little moisture, they are usually served at tea ceremonies**  
 ** _miko_ —Japanese, a Shinto priestess**  
 ** _onigiri_ —Japanese, rice balls with usually some sort of filling and a dried seaweed decoration**


	3. Adventures of Bentley-san

**Adventures of Bentley-** _ **san**_

* * *

Bentley was pretty sure that he was a dead turtle rolling. He'd been on his fair share of adventures, not always willing, since he'd met Sly Cooper. And while their enemies had been fierce, and he'd had more than his fair share of incidents, not the least of which cost him his legs and another his heart, he'd always thought that in the end, Sly and Murray would keep him from ever actually dying until he was a ripe old turtle, like the grandfather that had raised him before the orphanage.

But last night, Sly had gotten taken down by a member of his own clan in order to protect her young. One of which that was currently scampering up and down rice field dykes and trees like the raccoon he was, all because of Bentley's big mouth. And unlike Sly's weapon of choice, which was blunt and meant more for incapacitating an enemy, Karin's was a _blade_ and she was the daughter of a _samurai_ clan. If anything harmed even a head on Rioichi's head…

"I'm too young to die," Bentley moaned—or more accurately, panted, as he rolled his chair up a high dyke on the outskirts of the village that he'd just seen the raccoon kit scamper over. Not even the chair's motor was up for the steepness of the hill, and it was wearing him out. But the top was in sight. Just one more good push…

He reached the top with a sigh of pure relief, his head ducked down as he tried to recover. Time travel was murder on his asthma, and this sort of thing did not help. He pushed down on the switch of his chair to kick the motor back in and roll the rest of the way to the dams in piece. The motor was a soft, whirly hum.

And then his chair dipped, and the motor went from a hum to a roar.

Bentley jerked his head up and paled. The hill was even steeper on this side, and led straight down to the river. A swollen river that was _not happy_ to be blocked by the rough-shod dam that Bentley could now see. "Oh no, no, NO!" He killed the motor with a flip of the switch and threw on the emergency break.

He'd already picked up momentum, though. The breaks squealed and he could smell smoke rising from them. Oh, this was bad. Bad, bad, bad, bad, BAD! And no one in sight to help him—

Wait, he didn't need help! He was a genius, a master inventor, the brain of the Cooper Clan! Bentley hit a few of the switches with confidence to change the chair over to hover mode, where he could skip over that river like a rock over a smooth pond.

The buttons clicked, but it was hollow and with no responses.

Bentley's eyes widened. He'd killed the motor. The motor that fed all the gadgets on his chair. Oh, what had he _done?_ Frantically, he started pushing buttons to restart it, but he knew it was pointless. His mind was automatically doing the calculations and he was doomed, _doomed—_

"WEEEE!"

The happy squeal was soon followed by a solid thump to the back of Bentley's chair, sending it spinning down the slope. Bentley joined in, but his was a shriek of terror. They hit the end of the hill, and the river loomed. He covered his eyes, waiting for his life to pass before his eyes. There was a click behind him as something else was hit too.

The chair's power suddenly kicked on. Bentley's eyes opened and he gripped the arms. The hover function turned on too and slowed his descent. The chair evened out of the spin as they crossed over the river about a foot over the angry, silt filled water. It was the emergency mode, Bentley realized, meant to protect him should something like this happened as long as the power was on.

Sure enough, as soon as the chair detected solid, stable ground underneath itself, the hover mode turned off, and the wheels snapped back in to place.

Bentley could barely breathe, and belated realized it was his asthma responding to his panic. Reaching into his shell, he grabbed his inhaler and pulled it out. He gave it a rapid shake and quickly put it to his mouth for a couple puffs. His airway cleared, and the turtle collapsed in his chair with a moan. He was not meant for field work!

"Bentley- _san_ , what that?" Rioichi piped up, and the kit scrambled over Bentley's shoulder. It had been the little scamp that hit the chair…and saved his life, but Bentley wasn't about to acknowledge that. Especially when the Cooper kit reached out and snagged the inhaler right from Bentley's hand before scrambling up a tree with it.

"Hey! Bring that back!" Bentley said, wheeling his chair up to the base of the tree.

Rioichi ignored him and copied the turtle, shaking the inhaler. "What's it do? What's it do?" he asked…just as he pressed down on the dispenser. A cloud of white powder exploded in his face. At least his eyes were closed! He stuck his tongue and then whined. "It tastes bad!"

"That's because it's medicine!" the turtle said, shaking his finger at the kit and feeling like a cranky uncle. He pulled out his big guns. "What would your mother say if she knew you had stolen medicine from somebody who needed it?"

That got the little kit's attention. He scrambled down the tree and held out the inhaler. " _Gomen nasai,_ Bentley- _san_!" he said, quickly bowing over his outstretched arms. "Please, please don't tell _Haha-ue_!"

Grumbling, Bentley took his inhaler back and tucked it back into his shell. "Only if you promise to listen to me from now on," he said, keeping up his act of sounding more put out than he was. Oh who was he kidding? He was upset! Near-death experiences were not his forte. "Agreed?"

" _Hai!_ " Rioichi chirped, and quickly raised himself to lean on the armrest of Bentley's chair. "So what next then, Bentley- _san?"_

Bentley hummed, thinking about what he needed next. While getting more information on the guards and the layout of the village was important, there was something almost more so he needed done. "Do you know where the headman visits with important people?" he asked, and he saw the kit's face brighten at the idea of causing such an important grown-up some mischief. Gotta love the Cooper streak for trouble.

* * *

"Did it work, Bentley- _san?"_ Rioichi dropped off of the roof of the headman's house and directly into Bentley's lap.

"We'll see in a second," Bentley said, tapping on his holoscreen to get the video screen up and running. "Any trouble getting in?"

"Not for the ninja master!" Rioichi puffed his little chest out, his tail swishing and tickling Bentley's nose.

Sneezing, the turtle patted the kit on the head. "Good, good." His attention wasn't on the kit in his lap, though, but on the screen as the camera came into focus. The headman was another _capricornis crispus,_ or Japanese serow, dressed in modest clothing that befitted his status as a small, but important, village headman.

His new guest was another story. The dark navy of his _haori_ , and the slate gray of his formal style _hakama_ and…shoulder thingies… could not have been cheap, and the cloth was fine quality too. The dark, muted colors made the bright orange-red and white of his fur stand out, while making the black of his paws almost disappear. An _ailurus fulgens._ A sword hung by his side, and his eyes were narrowed in disdain.

"Coopergiwa is doing your village a great disservice, causing such trouble," the red panda said. "Even with your hired guards in place…" He tutted, trying to sound sympathetic but just sounding condescending.

"And it was quite gracious of you to pay for such guards, Minamoto- _sama_ ," the headman said with a quick ducking of his head. "We are such a minor holding, not even in your lands or that of your neighbor's really. It is more than we could ever hope to repay."

"Nonsense," the panda said, shaking his head. "The Coopergiwa clan is a _samurai_ clan, meaning that any of their troublemakers are the lords' responsibility to handle. You will let me know if she becomes more of a nuisance." It wasn't a suggestion.

"Of course, Minamoto- _sama_ ," the serow agreed. "But we cannot afford to feed more guards—"

"I don't intend to give you more men," Minomoto sneered. "I intend to capture the raccoon sow and take her off of your hands. Be sure to spread the word, so that if she causes anymore trouble, you may inform me at once."

"Yes, my lord." The serow bowed low, though there was a tinge of reluctance in his tone.

Bentley reached up and turned off the screen. In his lap, Rioichi was dead silent…and completely still. "I would bet my last motherboard that he is the one really behind all the sabotaging of the villagers' things," the turtle muttered.

" _Haha-ue_ is in trouble, isn't she, Bentley- _san?_ " Rioichi asked.

Bentley didn't see the point in lying, and nodded his head.

"Then we have to help her!" the kit insisted.

"We will," Bentley assured him. "We just need to finish taking these pictures so I can make up a plan."

"Then let's hurry!" Rioichi's tone was as grim as a young kit's could be.

Before Bentley realized what was happening, he had an empty lap and was being pushed rapidly along in the direction of the next target. "Whoa!" he shouted in protest…to deaf ears. "RIOICHI! WATCH OUT!"

 _CRASH!_

* * *

Karin swept Kaya's legs out from underneath her, then used the momentum to spin around and send Kiyo tumbling too. Both girls whined from their sprawls on the floor, _naginata_ clattering to the ground. Straightening up, Karin shook her head and leaned on her own glaive. "Tired already?" she asked.

" _Iie, Haha_ ," the two girls chimed, but they didn't rise up from their positions on the ground.

She rolled her eyes, but a smile tugged at the mother's lips. She was proud of her girls, she was. But one parent had to be the bully to make sure that all the kits got the training they needed, and that had to be her. "One more, and then we can stop," she promised.

" _Hai, Haha_ ," the girls said. They stayed still, but before Karin had to go over and nudge them, they were rising to their feet on their own, picking up their glaives. They weren't as tired as they thought they were, Karin could tell. Their feet and hands were steady. She hadn't pushed them too hard.

She braced herself, swinging her own _naginata_ in front of her defensively. The girls rushed her with high-pitched war cries that sounded more like baby birds screaming for food to Karin, making her snort in laughter before she could help it. She side stepped out of their way and prepared for their usual double-teaming tactics.

" _HAHA-UE!_ "

A little bundle of trouble came running into the dojo, heedless of the fact that there were weapons in use. Karin pressed her lips into a thin line. The girls didn't have the control to stop themselves, so she broke the half-lie she had been keeping up during their training about their mother's skill. With a quick sweep, she had them disarmed and sprawling with little effort. As for her son… Karin reached into the folds of her _haori_ and pulled out her _shukusen_ , the heavy fan made of steel with yellow silk stretched over the ribs that were sharpened at the edges.

Keeping it folded and thus relatively harmless, she whacked her son over the head with it.

He dropped with a wail.

Karin crossed her arms, completely unrepentant, and raised one brow. He clutched at his head and sniffled, but Karin wasn't swayed. "You know better than to come running into the dojo like that!" she scolded. "And stop crying, I doubt you are even bruised." She knew her own strength and weight of her weapon better than that. The whack would hopefully teach him a lesson that he ought to know by now…and help her heart settle from its place lodged in her throat. Her weapon had an edge to it, which was terrifying enough. And even if the girls' didn't, they were proper staffs with heavy metal on one end that could cause him harm before anyone was the wiser if he just came tearing in here!

Rioichi sniffed and rubbed his eyes, but he didn't argue with her, just rubbing his stinging head. "And after I rescued you today from the mean _daimyo_ ," he sulked, glaring at the floor.

"Rescued? What _daimyo_?" Karin asked, shocked out of her well-deserved crankiness.

"Bentley- _san_ called him a… a fungus…" Rioichi stopped his sniffling and looked up at her. "I think he meant he was a red cat-bear, but he was just showing off how smart he was." Her little boy wrinkled his nose. "Like Kaya does."

"I do not!"

"Do too!" he rebutted.

Karin cut the bickering off by reaching down and pinching Rioichi's ear. He yelped and tilted his head to try and ease the pain. "Red cat-bear?" she said softly, her mind turning. "What was his name, Rioichi?"

He stopped his whimpering, hearing from her tone of voice that she was in no mood for games or fussing over him or his sisters. "Minamoto- _sama,"_ he said. "That's what the headman called him after I planted the insect that is not an insect in his office like Bentley- _san_ asked."

Her mind whirled and she let go of Rioichi's ear unconsciously. Ken. It had to be Ken, there was no one… And her son almost crossed paths with him. Karin saw red. "Bentley!" she shouted, making all three of her kits jump in surprise and exchange terrified looks. Things were never good when their mother got that tone to her voice.

* * *

Sly became aware of the world around him in degrees, rather than his usual abrupt lurch to consciousness. He was warm, with a weight over him that signaled a blanket, something he didn't usually bother with. But he was glad for it, since the rough mats underneath him were _chilly_ to put it mildly. The cushion his head sat on wasn't that soft—in fact, it was kinda weirdly lumpy—but it was also warm, and the texture wasn't too bad.

Gentle fingers were rubbing through his hair in a manner that made his bones feel like they were melting. And someone, someone _female_ , was humming a melody before it turned into whispery song. "See the father bent in grief. The mother dressed in mourning. Sister crumbles, and the neighbors grumble. The preacher issues warnings."

Her tone was so sad… He wanted to hug whoever it was and tuck her under his chin. And that startled him awake enough to actually _listen_ to the next bit of lyrics and remember exactly who had to be the one singing to him.

"History… Little miss didn't do right went and ruined all the true plans. Such a shame. Such a sin…"

Sly cracked an eye open and met Lady's blank porcelain mask. "Something you wanna talk about there, Lady?" he asked before a jaw-splitting yawn overtook his mouth.

"Oh!" she huffed, and the hands in his hair stopped along with the singing.

The next thing he knew, his pillow was no longer underneath him. Yelping, he managed to catch himself on his elbows before he conked his head and knocked himself out again. He couldn't help but laugh at her reaction, resting his head on the floor anyway. "Show tunes? Seriously?"

"It's what Mama used to sing to us," she protested.

He laughed all the louder.

"See if I let you sleep in my lap again," the female raccoon grumbled.

Sly's eyes popped open and his laughter died. He sat up and stared at her in slack-jawed disbelief. She'd let him sleep in her lap? All night? But… But she didn't _like_ him, not even as a _friend!_ She wasn't lying, though, and he didn't need to see her face to know that. Her body moved stiffly around the room as she piled up the bedding that was scattered everywhere, and she had some sort of padded, silk robe over her shoulders that had to have been to keep her warm.

"You didn't have to do that…" he said, rubbing the back of his neck.

Lady paused in her current fold to snort at him. "You were about to fall asleep sittin' up, sugah," she drawled. "Yes, I did."

Sly grumbled. "I was not going to fall asleep…" but he knew it was a losing argument. He found his hat lying nearby and stuck it on his head, not even bothering with trying to fix his hair. It was just going to be a mess anyway. "How long was I out, anyway?" he asked, changing the subject.

She shrugged. "It was Pig last time they brought me tea, and they haven' been back in here since."

"It was what?" he said, wondering if he was still asleep.

He could tell she was smiling, even if he couldn't see it, he _knew_ it. "Feudal Japan kept a temporal clock with twelve hours named after the zodiac," she said. "Pig is roughly around ten in the evenin'. So it's about lunch time by thievin' hours, somewhere around eleven in the evenin' for normal folk."

"How do you _know_ all this?" he asked, flabbergasted.

She fiddled with the sleeves of her borrowed robe. "I was an unruly little urchin of a child," she said. "But as I said, my teacher had a friend who was a real lady. A g _eisha._ And I was fascinated by someone else havin' a white face like mine, even if it _was_ make-up, and asked her about bein' a _geisha_ and it just…"

"Snowballed," Sly finished for her. "Well, I guess I shouldn't complain—"

He was cut off by the shoji door sliding open with a clatter and Bentley wheeling into the room. But the turtle had seen better days. His glasses were askew, his face blank from shock and exhaustion, and were those twigs with leaves stuck on his vest?

Lady snorted, and then clapped her hand over her mask's mouth like it would help muffle it. Sly swallowed thickly to keep his own laughter down. "What happened to you, buddy?"

Murray came following after, carrying a tray loaded with tea things and a plate full of rice balls. He was making no attempts to stop the wide smile on his face. "He had to take his own photos," he told Sly gleefully. "Glad to see you awake, Sly! Just in time for lunch, or brunch I guess… Karin- _san_ taught me how to make _onigiri_!"

"Oh?" Sly said, reaching out to grab a rice ball. It actually looked good, angular and everything with the bit of seaweed at the end. "About Bentley, not the rice." The hippo's face fell, and Sly quickly recovered. "Though they look good, Murray." He took a big bite and was surprised that he actually meant it. They were good, and he didn't even _like_ rice. Was that salted salmon in the middle?

Murray beamed at him, and set the tray down on the table with a surprisingly graceful flourish. "Thank you! And yes, yes he did." The hippo didn't bother hiding his amusement. "He had some help."

"…Oh?" Sly ran through the possibilities in his head. Karin had obviously been here all day, and he hadn't been woken up for hours. He snickered. "Oh. I came by my hyper activeness as a kit honestly, I take it?"

Bentley moaned and hid his face in his hands.

Sly coughed and took another big bite out of his rice. And then his brain finished waking up and his earlier thoughts circled. He'd slept for hours. When he hadn't been sleeping for more than two at a stretch for weeks. And he _knew_ he hadn't been that tired, and that moon before he fell asleep…

A clatter of china came as Lady started pouring tea into mugs, her sleeves swept back to her elbows in a way that was like she had said before. Elegant and graceful.

That didn't stop Sly from connecting the dots. "Did you d _rug_ me?" he demanded of her.

She jerked the pot up in mid-pour, leaving the cup half empty as she stared at him. Even her tail froze. They stared off, or as best they could when her eyes were hidden by black netting.

It was broken by what could only be a war cry echoing through the compound. Sly gaped at his gang's genius as he recognized the voice—Karin—and the name she was shouting.

" _Bentley!"_

"What did you do?" Sly hissed, and scrambled for his cane. Oh, this was _not good_. Could this have waited until he had gotten to eat more than half a rice ball?

* * *

 ** _gomen nasai_ —Japanese, I'm very sorry**  
 ** _-sama_ —Japanese, title that is meant to signify high respect (unisex)**  
 ** _iie_ —Japanese, no**  
 ** _naginata_ —Japanese, a type of glaive, one that was well known to be used by noblewomen**  
 ** _shukusen_ —Japanese, a war fan**  
 ** _daimyo_ —Japanese, a warlord, they ruled over a very specific area and were serviced by samurai families. Whether or not the daimyo answered to the emperor depends on what period of history it is**


	4. The Cooper Handyman Gang

**The Cooper Handyman Gang**

* * *

Bentley quickly wheeled his chair further away from the door. "I didn't do anything!" he protested, eyes wide.

"That ain't what it sounds like, _cher_ ," Lady argued, breaking her staring contest with Sly to grab her own cane. "In fact, sounds like yah threatened her kin. What did you _do?"_

"Nothing!" Bentley insisted.

Karin stormed into the room, glaive in hand. Her face was stone, but her tail swished behind her in a fury. "You let _my son_ in the same room as Minamoto Ken," she snarled the name like it was a curse word. And with no real signs of warning, she leaped at Bentley, glaive extended to slice him in half.

"Whoa!" Sly said, shoving himself between Karin and Bentley on pure instinct. He didn't know why this felt familiar, but it did. Their staves clanged against one another, ringing like a large bell. She didn't even pause and moved to side step him. But Murray used the distraction time to move their turtle friend out of harm's way, and Lady used the crook of her cane to grab Karin's elbow.

"Lady- _san,"_ Karin said, her voice a near-growl.

"The turtle's denser than that shell of his, but he's harmless," Lady said, clapping Karin on the shoulder. The older raccoon was tense, but Lady didn't let it stop her. "Now, he didn' have much of a chance to tell us about this Minamoto fella," she said, pulling Karin towards one of the cushions. "How 'bout you sit down and tell us 'bout him?"

With obvious reluctance, Karin folded her legs to sit on the cushion. Sly didn't relax until she lowered her glaive to rest on the floor. Lady sat down next to her, setting her own cane down nearby so she could have her hands free in case she needed them. That let Sly relax a little into a cushion of his own. Murray set Bentley's chair down, but hovered protectively over his friend.

"The Minamoto clan is a _daimyo_ clan," Karin said slowly. "Whereas my family, the Coppergiwa, follows the way of the noble _samurai_. We had served many clans over the years, but for all our honor, we reached a time when an alliance became necessary. The Minamoto put up their youngest son, Ken, as an offering for me or one of my sisters, at the same time as a merchant offered his eldest son and heir. As my own father's eldest daughter, it would have been proper for me to marry the noble and bring him into our clan to inherit after my father."

"But proper don' mean right," Lady said softly.

"Yes." Karin's hands fisted in her _hakama_. "I could see his cruelty, and knew that he would bring nothing but pain and dishonor to my family. And Shinji…" She paused, and a soft, kind smile cross her face, the first any of them had seen of its like. It did wonders for her face, revealing that under the stern mask was a noble beauty. "He did not care that I was too serious, or too mannerly. He just wanted to make me laugh."

Murray sniffled, reaching into his belt pouch and pulling out a handkerchief. "That's so romantic…"

Karin ducked her head in embarrassment, her tail swishing behind her. "My father approved my marriage, and turned down the Minamoto clan," Karin said. "Ken was denied not only my hand, but that of my sisters'. I do not think he has ever forgotten…or forgiven…the perceived slight."

"So now we know a little more about what we are up against, at least in the short term." Sly nodded and clapped his hands. "Meanwhile," he turned on Lady. "You drugged me!?"

Lady rolled her head, looking at him and saying dryly, "You weren' sleepin', sugah. I helped."

"Helped?" he sputtered, "Drugging me is helping now?"

Clearing his throat, Bentley set some of his smaller drones out, creating a holo-table for them to use. If he didn't interrupt now, there was no telling how long the argument between the two raccoons would go. "Anyway," he said pointedly, bringing up some of his pictures. "This is Minamoto Ken, a red panda—"

"That is not a panda," Sly said with a frown, tilting the picture so he could see it better.

"Yes, it is," Bentley said, his eyes narrowing in annoyance.

"Bentley, I know what a panda is, and that is _not_ a panda," Sly argued. They'd had a panda on the team before, really, did Bentley think Sly was _that_ dumb?

"But you also didn' know what an albino raccoon looked like," Lady pointed out sweetly.

Sly glowered at her. Okay, he could believe _she_ thought he was that dumb. "Shut up, Lady."

"Call it like I see it, sugah," she said with a wave of her hand.

Bentley coughed to break up the bickering. "Right now, he appears to be playing both sides," he said. "He's making himself into the hero for the locals, and framing Coopergiwa- _san_ as the culprit. However, nothing appears to be any more than the usual threats Sly's family gets." Bentley steepled his fingers. "We've hit a waiting game. Unless Minamoto increases his aggression or something else appears, nothing here is the event we came looking for."

"Surely, we can do something in the meantime," Sly argued, poking at the various pictures Bentley and Rioichi had taken.

Murray nodded in agreement, and Bentley sighed. "Alright," he grumbled. "Let's work on fixing what's been messed up, which will hopefully improve Coopergiwa- _san's_ reputation, and aggravate Minamoto into acting." He picked a handful of the pictures out and hummed. "Murray, can you still use your Aboriginal Ball Form?"

"Be the Ball, the Murray can do," the hippo said, puffing out his chest.

"Good, then you'll use it to knock down these dams here that are wreaking havoc on the field irrigation systems." Bentley shoved some of the pictures around where Murray could see them. "I'll be your look out, so none of the guards can surprise you, and to keep you from knocking down the ones that are needed."

That left the second set of pictures, which he pushed in Sly's direction. "Sly, you are going to be picking the _ronins_ ' pockets. Either they are carrying the villagers' valuables on them, or they are hiding them somewhere. Find them so they can be returned."

"Don' I feel superfluous," Lady grumbled from her seat, crossing her arms and sticking her nose up in the air.

Bentley shot her a look of pure exasperation over his glasses. "Well, do you have thief senses?" he snapped back.

She tilted her head at him. "What?" she said blandly.

"Bentley," Sly hissed in warning.

Not that the turtle was listening, oh _no_. He rolled his eyes and adjusted his glasses. "Can you sense thieving opportunities? Blue auras?"

"Purple auras," she corrected automatically, and then paused before leaning forward. "Wait _, that's_ what those are?"

Sly slapped his hand over his face. "Thank you, Bentley, for revealing yet more Cooper family secrets. It's not like she's figuring them out on her own fast enough," he said sarcastically.

"I didn't expect her to say yes!" Bentley protested, but now there was a familiar gleam in his eyes. "But this is a good opportunity for some data gathering. I wonder if the different color is from a different thieving family, and if it works differently?"

"I wouldn' know, _cher_ ," Lady drawled. "Ain't had a chance to see Sly in action. Just a lot of talk."

The male raccoon glowered at her, flicking his tail behind him. All talk, no action _indeed._

"Then you can work alongside him to retrieve the valuables," the turtle said.

Karin snorted, looking between the three of them. "Then I will teach them some techniques that they need," she said firmly.

Bentley raised one finger. "Sly is already a Master Thief, with access to all of his family techniques."

"And while he may be quieter than you or your friend, he cannot cross nightingale floors, and I am not the only one in the village who employs them." Karen's eyes narrowed at Bentley. "The silent hunter eats, Bentley-san." Unsaid it went that he didn't have much room to give her lip.

Beside her, Lady made a chopping motion across her neck, a warning at Bentley to shut up and do as the more traditional lady said.

Swallowing, Bentley pulled his head back into his shell a little. "Agreed," he managed to squeak out.

* * *

"Again, Sly- _san,"_ Karin barked as the floors gave a series of squeaks under his foot.

Grimacing, Sly didn't bother avoiding the creaks on his way back to the start point. Lady's ears flicked back, but her tail swayed side to side rather than her vocally giving him a hard time. That had passed over an hour ago. Neither of them were doing well at this. While Lady had amazing body memory, reading the floor was difficult for her—she got further each time only because she knew where not to step. Meanwhile, Sly could get a read…but his feet didn't always go where he knew they _needed_ to go.

Karin shook her head, but her shoulders also had a tremor to them. Drat it all, she was trying not to laugh at them! Sly scowled, his tail joining Lady's in swishing. "I think my kits make less noise than you do," she said at last.

Lady snorted, uncrossing her arms and shaking her shoulders loose. "I knew _about_ them, not how to walk on them," she muttered in protest.

"More than I knew," Sly said snidely as Lady took her first step on to the floor.

She turned her head to scoff at him. "Yer ancestor is our teacher, Cooper, did you skip a section in yer precious book?" she drawled back, twisting her body around as she took the next series of steps. She hesitated, and then made a step forward, her first new step. There was silence, and she let out a soft breath. She was about half way across the floor panel now.

"It wasn't in the book!" he snapped at her, crossing his arms in annoyance. His pique rose as she made another lucky guess and got forward again.

Karin hummed from her watching point, sitting in a lotus position as she watched them. "I swore I had already written down the construction of such floors, as well as how to walk them in _our_ book," she said as if musing.

Sly's shoulders rose up closer to his ears. "We're having trouble reading your section," he admitted in a mutter. "Can't tell if it was a transcribing error, or if two books were married together and pieces were lost." It didn't help that Bentley couldn't read the kanji properly, it was a nightmare.

She hummed again, not making a comment. Lady made another guess, and while the creak was nowhere near as loud as any of Sly's, it was still audible.

Karin's ears flicked back and then forward again. "Let us break for tea," she suggested, standing up. "And perhaps some meditation to calm your minds."

"I've never meditated a day in my life," Sly muttered crankily. "That's Murray's bailiwick. I just pick up the skills."

"Well this one ain't that easy, sugah," Lady muttered back, stalking past him and inside.

He scowled at her backside, reluctantly following both women to the kitchen table. Karin whipped together a green tea pretty quickly, setting cylinder-shaped cups in front of both of them as well as herself. Lady at least seemed to like the taste—Sly wasn't sure how he felt about it, but knew better than to ask for water. Up until a certain time in history, the water was not particularly safe to drink, they'd learned the hard way in Galleth's time.

"You each have what the other needs," Karin said at last, looking between them. "Lady knows what her body is doing, from pinkie toe to ear and tail tips. Not a step out of place…once she knows where the places are. Sly has the experience to see the minute differences in the floor, but cannot convince his body where to place his steps." She frowned and tilted her head. "And for some floors, he will not be able to at all."

"What, why?" Sly argued. They were both raccoons, both thieves, but he was a Cooper, a Master Thief! He should be able to do this without any problems once he mastered the skill.

"Because you have six inches and fifty pounds on me, sugah," Lady said drily. "Though I think yah should have more like seventy-five." She gave Karin a significant look. There was no should there, Lady _knew_. He'd slept in her lap last night, she'd had plenty of time to take in his physical status, and what she saw had her fur itching. Sly was severely underweight under his own fluffy coat.

Frowning, Karin stood up and walked into her pantry. Sly looked between the two females, feeling like he missed some sort of silent conversation. Especially when Karin came back out with a bowl of rice and some smoked fish that she set down in front of him with a pair of chopsticks. He was a little hungry, though, so he accepted the snack.

"So some of the floors won' take yer extra weight, or are spaced so yer broader foot is gonna hit something regardless of how good you are," she said like it was conversational. Lady looked into her tea cup with a frown. "Not that I can see either way…"

Sly frowned around a bite, not sure how to explain how he saw the way the wood fell wrong. Maybe it was something that came from more experience, something Lady would get in time.

…Much like it was going to take more than one day to learn how to place his feet.

Ugh, this was one of those leadership lessons, wasn't it? Grimacing around his chopstick, he stood up with the bowl. "Come on," he grumbled. "We're going to try something."

Raising her brows, Lady gave Karin a polite bow of her head and hurried after Sly. He took the side they had been working from, but sat down with his legs folded. "You walk, I'll help," he said.

"But how will that help me see it for myself?" she protested.

"It won't," he said bluntly. "That's going to take time, walking on different environments. But we'll practice. I need to tone my body memory up to match my eyes, which is also going to take a while. But in the meantime? I can guide you through it."

She narrowed her eyes, her tail twitching behind her, but she started her walk around the boards. When she reached the last place she had been, she turned back to look at him.

Glancing at the floor, he pointed towards her right. "On the right, but skip a step," he advised.

She nodded, and extended her leg in a move that screamed ballet training, re-enforcing to Sly where she had gotten her excellent body awareness. Lady skipped the row he had meant, landing her foot in a safe area and bringing her weight on to the ball of that foot singularly. He stole a bite of food, and continued to give her directions across the tricky layout.

Lady did a back-flip from a standstill—a difficult move that impressed Sly more than he wanted to admit—in order to escape the last foot of squeaky floors. "Well, that's one way around it," she admitted, turning to look at Sly across the six feet of flooring. "But I still want to learn how to see it for my own."

"We'll trade," he said, standing up and licking the last of the rice out of the bowl (to Lady's obvious disgust). He didn't know where the habit came from, it was probably out of Egypt since he didn't usually do it. "You show me how you trained your body to move that precisely, I'll give you ground-reading exercise. Deal?"

She grumbled, but nodded her head in agreement. Finally, unable to take it, she snatched the bowl from him. "For God's sake, ask for seconds," she snapped and stomped inside. Startled, he followed her only to have a second bowl thrust at him while Karin looked on in amusement. He sat back down at the table in befuddled amusement, finishing a second bowl entirely before Lady would even hear of leaving.

* * *

They reached the village about the time several loud booms echoed across the village. When Lady looked at Sly, he imagined behind her mask, her eyes were wide. "That is probably Murray and Bentley," he said with a shrug. "Come on, that's going to attract a lot of attention."

She nodded and followed him into the village proper. They stuck to the roofs, following guards. Lady took off on her own a couple of times, always coming back with something in her hands—seeing her own version of thieving auras, no doubt. He would do the same, leaving her to track whoever they were currently following.

Together, they reached the village inn, or at least the people who were housing the extra guards. Sly and Lady circled the building, and she was the one who found an unseen entry point. The rope didn't precisely go to the window in question, but it was close enough that they could both jump the gap on to the sill. She went first to open the window, her mask catching the moonlight a little too much for Sly's sanity. He wanted her inside as fast as he possibly could.

Once both of them were inside, they had to navigate their way down the stairs, to the inner walkways between rooms.

Sly spotted something, and managed to snag Lady's elbow before she got ahead of him. He whispered in her ear, "Floors," and she understood, shuffling in front of him. Quietly, he guided her through, at times hesitating as he was forced to rely on moonlight and the occasional bit of lantern light.

She reached the edge of the floor, and took off at a run for a room to the right. He waited with baited breath, and sighed in relief as she returned with both arms full. At times, she almost stumbled walking back, but he reached out and snagged her by the waist, pulling her to safety.

"Thanks, sugah," she breathed, handing him one of the packages. "Come on, let's get all this loot back."

He took the package in agreement, hurrying them both out of there. Karin joined them on the village edges, and knew who each of the belongings went home to.

At least, until they got to the bottom of Lady's bag. She held up two items with a frown. One some odd blade that Sly couldn't figure out what it was. The other was a string of gold coins, current time currency, with a tag on the end of the ribbon.

"That's a _kunai,"_ Lady said helpfully as Sly twisted the blade around in his hand gingerly before handing it towards Karin. "They are known as a ninja's weapon, at least in our time."

"Here as well," Karin agreed, frowning. "But there are no ninja in this village."

"And that's not our biggest problem," Lady said.

"What's worse than ninjas?" Sly asked, half sarcastic.

In response, she held up the tag on the coins for him to see. He tilted his head, and then swallowed thickly. Gears and wings. Clockwerk.

* * *

 ** _ronin—_ Masterless samurai, a warrior who doesn't serve any particular daimyo**  
 ** _kunai_ —Japanese, a throwing knife made out of or to mimic the shape of a trowel that has been weaponized**


	5. What Can and Can't Be Replaced

**What Can and Can't Be Replaced**

* * *

Jumping across the roof tops, Karin checked to make sure her young cousin and Lady were busy still. They had fallen into one of their squabbles again—it had been long enough that it was inevitable. At least they were keeping quiet about it as they waited for the turtle and the hippo to return from their own mission.

It was too soon for there to be any actual effect, but Karin couldn't help herself. She had to know if things were better, if the danger to her and her children had passed. The villagers had never exactly welcomed them with open arms, but if she could avoid a mob…

She paused, looking out over this small village that had been her home for so many years now. Her family's compound was much further inland, but Shinji had persuaded her to come further out, closer to his family and yet still in easy travel to her parents if invited. It was the perfect balance, and she loved him even more for finding it. It had been a fresh start for her too, not only as a young bride to her husband, but here, no one knew of the shame to the Coopergiwa clan, or about her own fearsome reputation. Here she was supposed to be allowed to raise her children, to train them, and then to finally step back herself—

A _shuriken_ flew through the air, landing in front of her and into the thatch of the roof. She scrambled to a stop, sliding on the slick straw. But she knew how to fall, and made sure that when she reached the end, she tumbled down to the ground with no injury, if perhaps a lot of noise. Thankfully, the guards weren't around, distracted by the dams' fall no doubt.

As she got her feet back under her, she heard several squeaks, and black blobs landed on the roof. Big ears twitched with the squeaking, and she scowled. Bats, it _had_ to be bats. While they were almost blind with their weak eyesight, it was their only weakness.

And they traveled in swarms.

Karin swung her _naginata_ , trying to keep room to maneuver as they converged on her. But they weren't attacking like she expected. Some had kunai in hand, they used the hooks on their wings to ward off her glaive, but... She eyed one's belt. Yes, they all were wearing short swords. Why would none of them meet her in combat like honorable men? She pushed it out of her mind, stepping into the pattern of the glaive, as graceful as any dance and as deadly as a swordsman, with twice the reach.

But it was hard to defend herself from all sides. One got in close, and wrapped itself around her back, holding a foul-smelling cloth to her nose and mouth. It left her no choice but to hold her breath or breathe it in.

Karin's eyes widened in understanding. This wasn't a fight, this was a kidnapping attempt!

"Now _chers_ , that ain't nice!" a familiar voice drawled, and the bat behind her let go with a pained screech.

Karin collapsed on the ground, choking on clean air. When she looked up, she saw that her cousin was beside her, making sure she was okay, before they set about defending her from the ninja. Between the two of them, they managed to at least scatter her attackers off into the dark.

"Flyin' rats, I swear," Lady grumbled, moving to help Karin stand up. "Coopergiwa- _san_ , yah doin' okay?"

"Yes, thank you," she managed to tell her, holding her pounding head. "My glaive, where…?"

"Sorry, it looks like they wanted to make sure you couldn't fight back once they got you away," Sly told her grimly, holding out…what remained of her glaive. The blade was distorted and dented, no doubt ruined unless it was melted down, and that could weaken it. The wood was unevenly shattered in two, with ragged splinters as the strong limb had tried to stay together until it finally gave up, large shards missing as newly freed splinters.

She held the ruined pieces in her hands, and Sly wondered, for a moment, how long she'd had it. He was using his father's cane, and while it showed its age, it had lasted for two lifetimes. It had to be heart-wrenching. But he glanced up over the roofs. "We can't stay here," he told Lady softly.

"Were they just more guards?" she asked, sounding unsure.

He shook his head. "No, they didn't seem to have the same goal." Sly hadn't been involved in any kidnapping schemes (to his knowledge), but the signs were pretty clear, sparking memories of the incident at the ballet with Lady. He wasn't sure if the parallels were deliberate or not.

"Well ain't that comfortin'." Lady shook her head, letting her sarcasm drop, and moved to where she could support an obviously exhausted and emotionally numb Karin. "Come on, let's get back to the compound. She might need to rest a bit, get whatever that gunk was outta her system."

"Right," he agreed, moving to help her carrying his ancestress back home. Murray and Bentley could just catch up with them.

* * *

Lady slid open the _shoji_ screen carefully. She'd barely gotten it open enough before the twins were on her, taking the tray and carrying it inside. Karin was propped up in a large _futon_ , probably hers and her husband's, with Rioichi curled up next to her. Sly and his boys were respectfully sitting a safe distance away.

"Thank you, Lady- _san_ ," Karin said softly, taking a cup of tea from the tray.

"Any word on if yer cane is gonna be salvageable?" she asked genuinely, taking a seat nearby.

Karin sighed, shaking her head.

Bentley adjusted his glasses. "We have notes in the Thievus Racoonus about building a cane, though I am not sure of all of the instructions. We could probably have a new glaive ready for her tomorrow."

"If you have not made a glaive before, I will not have you use mine as a learning process," Karin snapped. She reached up and rubbed her forehead slightly. "Sly- _san_ , surely you have had to make a new cane already."

Sly looked up at the ceiling. "Um, nope. I inherited my father's, and I've just been using it." He eyed Lady. "And I have no idea how she got her hands on one."

Karin made a noise of genuine disgust. She gave Rioichi a nudge, pushing him to stand up. "Kiyo- _tan_ , Rioichi- _kun_ , go fetch _Chichi-ue_ for me."

" _Hai, Haha-ue,"_ they agreed in sync, scurrying out of the room.

Kaya immediately occupied Rioichi's place, and while running her fingers through her daughter's fur, Karin began to explain. "Forget your instructions," she said firmly. "I am going to walk my young cousin through the process of forging the type of weapons my clan is well known for, that which I sense is the base for your own. While you are still amateurs, I can guide you and it will be better than attempting to follow instructions."

Bentley shifted in his chair. "Coopergiwa- _san_ , we are more than able to make a weapon," he tried to temporize.

Lady's snort immediately undermined him. "Speak for yerself, turtle. I don' know nothin' 'bout Japanese smithin' techniques, aside from they are complicated and fussy and it takes learnin' under a master to get them right. Sounds like somethin' yer boy needs."

Sly coughed and decided to stay out of the conflict between his brain and Lady. He had a feeling it was safer that way. They were kept from devolving into all-out-war by Rioichi returning, hopping up on to his mother's bed to join his sister for cuddles. The other twin was easily spotted in the arms of the raccoon who entered. Grey toned like Sly, he favored muted blues for his _hakama_ that made him seem rather drab.

But then he smiled at Karin, tickling his daughter to make her giggle, and Sly could almost see why Karin liked this guy enough to marry him, just from that alone. "Are you feeling better, dear?" he asked, his voice closer to being without an accent than Karin's as well.

"Yes, darling," she assured him, and then gestured towards the gaggle of time travelers. "Come meet our guests. The male raccoon is Sly Cooper, your cousin, if perhaps distantly. He travels with the Lady Masque, the Murray, and Bentley."

Shinji looked over them and gave a short bow. "A pleasure to meet you," he said politely. "My children have spoken much of all of you, and Karin says that she is teaching you some skills."

Sly grimaced. "Trying to, anyway." He and Lady really needed to practice walking on nightingale floors some more before either could be considered proficient.

"We are letting his sneaking skills go for a moment to focus on another," Karin butted in. "My glaive needs repaired, and he needs to learn the craft."

Shinji's expression immediately brightened. "I see, so you will need bronze."

"Hmm, and some of the blessed wood," Karin added, as if making a list.

"Blessed?" Lady repeated skeptically. "Yer odds of gettin' this particular Cooper," she pointed at Sly with her thumb, "into a church or temple for any reason besides stealin' from it seems low, _chere_."

Shinji laughed, flopping over on to the _futon_ , while Karin sniffed. The kits decided to follow their father's example, also giggling. "I am sorry, my flower, that your spiritual awareness appears to not extend towards my cousin," he apologized, sounding both sincere and a little mocking at the same time. Straightening up, he smiled at Sly. "I am not sure what help I can be in finding glaive wood, but I do have something to help with the bronze."

"You do?" Sly asked cautiously, a little unnerved by this talk of spiritual awareness running through his family tree. He remembered Rioichi's meditations, but… He'd never felt anything like that. Had he? His head hurt…

Shinji hummed and nodded. "Yes, yes. It is a little tool I have been working on, to help my fierce wife with the way loose change seems to keep rolling uphill," he said with a wave of his hand. "It attracts the metal, you see."

"The coin magnet!" Bentley blurted out, his eyes wide. "You're the one who invites her coin magnet!"

"Will invent," Shinji corrected his verb tense good-naturedly. "It is giving me a little trouble still, but now that I have proper incentive, I will work to have it up and running tomorrow."

"Bentley, mind helping him with that?" Sly asked, though it felt completely unnecessary. If he could, the turtle would be bouncing in his wheelchair. Hopefully they wouldn't lose Bentley to this time period and the latest person he could bond with over inventing things.

"The Murray can go and find the sacred wood, Sly," their muscle volunteered, surprising Sly for only a second.

The same could not be said for Lady. "You can?" she asked, but unlike whenever she questioned Bentley, there was genuine curiosity in her tone rather than derision. It was obvious that the hippo had her actual affection rather than just tolerance like she exhibited for the turtle.

He nodded and gave her a wide smile. "I was an apprentice to an Aboriginal mystic for a while. I gave it up to come back to the gang, but I haven't completely lost my edge. If Karin- _san_ can tell me what to sense, I can knock over the tree with my Ball form and bring the wood back here for shaping."

Karin nodded. "He has already proven that he and I can sense similar things, if perhaps differently due to our differences in training and upbringing."

"Great, so what are we supposed to do?" Lady asked Sly, sounding bored.

She may have meant it rhetorically, but he knew what the answer was. "Work on nightingale floors," he said with a sigh. "Come on, you help me with body memory, I'll help you with perception."

Grumbling, she accepted the hand up, and the group slowly separated. Shinji helped wheel Bentley after him to go to his workshop, Sly and Lady went to the nearest entry way with the floor patterns, already bickering over each other's flaws and strengths. Murray stayed behind, not only to help corral the youngsters to bed in a bit, but also to find out from Karin exactly what he was looking for. Comparing Japanese Shinto to Australian Aboriginal required a little bit of communication, but he thought he had the gist of it.

By the time he finished, Murray headed back to the room their little gang had taken over. He saw Bentley was muttering as he helped get the bedding out for the night. Lady had managed to find _futon_ pads somewhere, one actually large enough for Murray and another about the same size. While she was waiting on Bentley, she had produced a wooden comb from somewhere and was attacking her tail fur with cranky mutterings in French as she hit knots.

It made Murray glad he didn't have hair. "Hey, Bentley, let me get those," he insisted, coming over to grab blankets to distribute out. He claimed his pile, handed the ones that Bentley had used last night, and then waited on Lady to finish with her grooming.

Sly came into the room before that happened, taking the bedding from Murray to plop it down next to Lady. "Here you go, your highness," he said with an edge of sarcasm.

"Don' go gettin' spiteful 'cause I'm learnin' the floors faster than you," she quipped back, finishing her current stroke with a flourish. She swept her legs to the side, knocking Sly down in the process, and grabbed his tail.

"What _are_ you _doing?!"_ he sputtered, trying to yank it free, but she just held on tighter and smacked his reaching hands with the comb.

"Ye're as raggedy as a tumbleweed, sugah," she drawled, deftly beginning to groom his tail. He flushed and settled down with ill-grace, crossing his arms and turning his back on her…and therefore making her job easier, but she wasn't going to tell _him_ that. She eyed his stiff back, noting how it slowly lost at least some of the tension as she worked. Huh, so there was _that_ theory confirmed. She couldn't do _all_ of his fur, she had _some_ boundaries, but if she tackled his tail and his hair when she did hers, maybe it would create a link between his brain and 'time to sleep.'

Finishing his tail with a similar flourish as she did her own, she didn't let go till she was up on her knees. As soon as she released his tail, she grabbed his shoulders, and _pulled._

Sly toppled backwards with a yelp, his head landing in Lady's tummy. He blinked up at her, but she had already pulled off his hat and had her fingers in his hair. "Sugah, you have the worst hat hair I have _ever_ seen," she told him bluntly, but the comb was highly distracting. It shouldn't have felt this good, but Sly found himself melting as the wooden teeth tingled against his scalp.

"Murray, _cher_ , would yah help me get the blankets over him?" she asked quietly.

That snapped him out of it. "Oh no, we are not doing this again!" he said firmly, immediately trying to sit up.

Lady grabbed his shoulders and pinned him back down. "I mean, I could always drug yah with one of the turtle's darts again, but yah got so upset about that last time…" she drawled.

"No, you are not drugging me, I'm _fine,"_ he argued.

" _You_ are sleep deprived, and if I took off that mask of yers, there'd be big old bags under yer eyes," she said, poking him right between them as if to make a point.

"You can't go another night without sleep," Sly tried to argue, hoping to get out of this.

She flicked her fingers to lightly tap him enough that he flinched with a hiss. "And you ain't gettin' out of gettin' some shut-eye yerself. Now, if I were to ask yer friends how you've been sleepin' up till last night…?" She looked towards them as if to prove a point.

Bentley adjusted his glasses nervously. "According to the security system, Sly has been sleeping in small snippets and then doing work for another hour or two before attempting sleep again. If I were to guess, it is leading to an inadequate amount of time in REM sleep, though it is better than nothing, and it is an improvement since his return from… a mission," he ended delicately, probably deciding it wasn't safe to tell the one who was leery of time travel that it was possible to get lost in time and space.

"Uh huh." Lady looked down at Sly, and not for the first time, he cursed that mask. It was hard to argue with something that didn't show expression. "And last night, yah slept clean through the night. Any time you started up, I was there to soothe yah out of it."

He scowled up at her, trying to ignore his embarrassed flush at needing comforting from a nightmare like a kit. She was _not_ winning this argument. "You still need sleep."

"I'm a light sleeper, Cooper. I'll wake up if we both sleep on this _futon,"_ she pointed out, tail twitching in her annoyance as he continued to be unnecessarily stubborn. "I will get a dart," she added her threat, moving as if to push him off her lap to get one.

"You could always use one of the old music boxes," Murray pointed out.

"Murray!" Sly snapped, tail bristling. The hippo shrugged, not in the least upset by his tone. Collapsing downwards, he scowled. "Traitor."

"No, I just like you better when you are well-rested, Sly," his friend assured him.

"Be nice," Lady scolded on top of that and looked to Murray. "Music boxes?"

"Yeah, we used to throw them at guards, the music puts the guards to sleep, no problem," he said, nodding his head. Bentley's fingers twitched anxiously at the reminder of this old tool, and Lady spotted it.

She didn't blame him. Being put to sleep like that, and in this small of an area? There was a chance that all of them would be asleep, and if they couldn't wake up in case of an attack, that just spelled disaster. "I think under threat of a music box, _Monsieur_ Cooper is gonna behave," she drawled instead, raising her brows even though she knew he couldn't see them.

With a sigh, he rolled until he was lying on the futon, his back turned towards her. "Fine, fine," he grumbled. "We'll sleep on the same mat."

"Thank yah for yer cooperation," she said sarcastically. She made funny gestures towards Murray, which at least got him to chuckle, and finished getting them settled with blankets, their canes in easy reach…and twining her tail with his, she made sure that even though they were facing opposite directions, he knew she was there. It was easier than trying to be the big spoon when he was so much bigger than her!

Unbeknownst to those who slept inside the Coopergiwa house, a series of shadows watched from the bamboo forest, beady eyes narrowing as they squeaked, big ears twitching as they appraised the home.

* * *

 ** _shuriken_ —Japanese, a throwing knife shaped like a star**  
 ** _chers_ —French, plural of cher, dears**  
 ** _shoji_ —Japanese, paper screens that were commonly used for walls and doors in traditional Japanese homes**  
 ** _futon_ —Japanese, a floor mattress for a traditional style bed**  
 ** _Chichi/-ue_ —Japanese, Father**


	6. The Truth Behind the Poetry

**The Truth Behind the Poetry**

* * *

Karin poked her head into the side room where her guests had fallen asleep, feeling much better for a good night's sleep. Whatever the bats had used on her the day before had thankfully not had a permanent effect on her. Aside from sleeping harder, it was like nothing had happened the night before.

Well, almost, judging by the status of the room she just stepped into.

She covered her mouth to muffle any sound at the snoring duet of the hippo and the turtle, amused beyond measure. And then her heart felt like it was being squeezed when she saw her estranged cousin, wrapped around the young Lady and holding her close to him. She was using his tail as a pillow as she hid her mask-covered face in his chest, her own tail wrapped around their thighs and calves for extra warmth.

It seemed like as much as they protested while awake, they trusted each other while asleep. Sly in particular had to feel that way, judging by what she had seen, though now that she had a chance… Karin detected a fragility to Lady's spirit that she hid under her brash manner. Yes, she needed as much help as he did.

With no sound, Karin backed away slowly, tapping her chin in thought. Her waking them up would just embarrass her cousin, and she didn't want to upset anything that was currently happening between them. So there was going to have to be a different approach, and she knew exactly which one.

Sly was warm, and he was comfortable. A dim corner of his mind knew that he was waking up, but he couldn't give a fig. This was the best sleep he'd had in ages, and he wanted to wallow in it for as long as possible. He tucked his head down, the scent of orchids almost comforting, even with the tangy bit of orange underneath stirring his primal brain's interest, as he tried to bury his nose in the source.

Something hard and heavy slammed into him. _"Ohayo!"_ a high voice yelled at full volume. Someone else close to Sly yelped in pain.

He reacted before he had a chance to process it. He reached up and grabbed the assailant, throwing it off of him as he sat up, a low growl in the back of his throat.

Rioichi hit the screens with a rattle and slid down, but immediately bounced back up on his feet. "Meanie!" he protested, rubbing at the back of his head like it hurt.

A hard rap came on top of Sly's head before he had time to process it all. "Don't be mean to the kit," a groggy female said.

Sly's mouth felt dry. He hadn't meant to hurt Rioichi! He'd just, just…

A small hand pressed against his chest. "Easy, sugah," Lady murmured, her curls falling loose from her braid to fall in the way of mask that also looked crooked. She was trying to get him to lay back down, tugging at her limbs. They were so tangled up in each other, he needed to be in the same position to get them undone.

He flushed in embarrassment, quickly trying to free himself and get out from under the covers. Oh God, Carmelita was going to kill him if she ever found out about this. Dead, he was a dead raccoon. He bit back the urge to whimper, and then side-eyed Lady. Why wasn't she freaking out about this, with all her protests about not liking Coopers?

Rioichi skipped his way back over, clambering into Lady's lap. "Again, again!" he demanded.

Laughing, Lady cuddled Rioichi close. "I don' think your mama would appreciate us throwin' yah into walls," she told him.

"Awww, but it fun! And I'm the ninja master, I won't hurt!" he pouted with his protest.

She chuckled, tucking him up close to her. "A tiny ninja," she cooed in what was possibly the most patronizing way possible.

Rioichi wrinkled his nose in distaste but submitted to her affections. He also used her moment of distraction to stick his tongue out at Sly.

Sly resisted the urge to growl at the little brat. "I know what you grow into, squirt," he said in warning.

The screen slid open. "You must share that someday, Sly- _san_ ," Karin said dryly, coming into the room as Murray and Bentley rubbed their eyes, waking up slowly with all the volume preventing any further sleep for anybody. She helped start to fold up fabric, eyeing the two raccoons. "Although, when you begin having kits of your own, you had better be used to such an awakening."

Lady snorted, and Sly flushed darkly. "It, we, we're not like that!" he stammered out, reaching for his hat and jamming it on his head so he could hide under the brim.

"Sugah, you're datin' a trigger-happy fox, I don't think it's a concern at all," Lady pointed out.

Karin's eyebrows shot right up and she looked at Sly. "A fox?"

"Just because Carmelita shot you, doesn't mean she's _that_ bad," Sly weakly defended her, and then slouched. "And we're not dating, we're… paused." He didn't want to accept Carmelita's weak attempt at a break-up, and without her around, he didn't have to. Paused was the best way of explaining it.

Lady snorted again.

Clearing her throat, Karin patted one of the quilts draped over her arms, not wanting to touch this with the end of her glaive. "Now that you have settled. Bentley- _san_ , my husband believes he has finished the magnet with your help." She paused and wrinkled her nose. "But I cannot say I trust him with it. Would you be willing to use it to find the necessary bronze?"

"Uh, sure, Coopergiwa- _san_ , but… Can I ask why?" Adjusting his glasses, Bentley couldn't help but get bad feelings from his last little adventure around the village.

"Shinji is clumsy," Karin said bluntly. "And just as prone to pranks as my son. I would feel better if someone went with him to keep an eye on how it goes."

Bentley gulped and looked at Sly silently for help.

Rubbing the back of his neck, Sly looked up at the ceiling and shook his head. Yep, time to rescue his brain. "Well, I think I remember how your Coin Magnetism technique works. I could go with—"

" _No,"_ Karin snapped with such a tone of authority that Sly meeped and stood up straighter, wide-eyed. She took a deep breath and repeated, "No. Sly- _san_ , I know you cannot see it, but you are torn apart inside. Some of the more mystic levels of techniques are not healthy for you to use right now. Let Bentley and my husband search for the bronze, and Murray and I to find the wood."

Sly winced, slouching and trying not to pout about being kept out of the loop.

Lady wasn't about to let that stand, though. She poked Sly in the side. "Come on, then. You and I can keep an eye on the kits." She ignored how he winced, and instead the two females started herding the group of thieves off to their respective jobs, even if not everyone was happy about it.

* * *

Sly left Lady playing with the kits (it was a very thorough game of hide and seek) to see how things were going for the others. Escape had been tricky, he had severely underestimated how difficult managing three kits could be, even if the two girls were very well behaved. But Lady turned out to be a pro at it, though she'd held Rioichi up by his collar using her cane at one point to get him to leave his sisters alone.

It took a little bit of wandering around, but then he found what looked to be a workshop. He poked his head inside, just as Murray set down a set of wood while Bentley cleaned his glasses, Shinji sorting out bits of bronze. "Oh hey, looks like you guys met with some success. Good work," he complimented them, patting them on the shoulder. Murray's chest puffed up and Bentley raised his chin in pride.

Karin was crouched in front of a strange furnace, measuring the heat with a critical eye. "And now we must use those materials they have gathered for us." She straightened up and gave Shinji a look. "My darling…?"

He coughed. "Right, I am not to be in the forge when the fires are on. Bentley- _san_ , perhaps you could come to my workshop? And I am sure the kits would love to spend time with you, Murray- _san_."

"Yeah, Lady has them handled," Sly drawled.

Bentley looked up at Shinji. "Be afraid, be _very_ afraid," he said in a dead-serious tone. Rolling his eyes, Murray moved to help with getting Bentley out of the shop to the turtle's sputtering protests that he could do it on his own. Shinji gave Sly a quick bow and hurried after them, heading towards a different outbuilding that Murray also stopped at. Ah, so that was his mysterious workshop. So that made this Karin's?

"Lady- _san_ seems very capable," Karin said, laying out tools on the table. Yep, definitely her space. "Now Sly- _san_ , come here." Reluctantly, he shoved his hands into his pockets and came to see what she had. "These have passed through my family for generations," she said, indicating a leather pouch that had several fine steel tools laid out in neat pockets.

And they were probably in hers or Rioichi's section of the vault. Sly memorized their shape so he could find them once back in their own time. She explained what each tool was and what purpose it served. Murray had brought back plenty of wood, which gave Sly a chance to practice with them. It was…a lot harder than Karin made it seem, though she had hers carved and smoothed down with ease.

Then came shaping the bronze, a long process of melting and purifying that made Sly sweat through his fur. He knew that his own cane had a steel core, that would only make the process worse.

At last, she laid out a series of molds. "Now, I use a glaive, here," she said, pointing to one of the larger blocks. "But there are other shapes you can use. I suggest making friends with a smith, to make the molds. They can help you make finicky parts to suit your own specialty, which is…?"

Sly's brain felt greasy. "I, um. Don't have one," he realized.

She tilted her head. "Did you come into your warrior status late in life, Sly- _san?"_

He waffled, because he'd gotten some training from his dad before they died, but he hadn't gotten into the skills of his family until he was eighteen. Did that buy him more time? But he had talked about settling down with Carmelita! But what about his family, the long line of Coopers that had resulted in him? Panic ate at the corners of his mind. "I'm twenty-four and I have nothing to add to the book," he realized out loud, reaching up to grab his hat and pull it down tighter like that would help him feel better.

A high, breathy laughter that was slightly muffled made his spine stiffen up, and he turned to look. Lady was leaning in the door way, tail swishing and her mask giving her the illusion of a Cheshire smile. "Sugah, ain't cha a little young to be worryin' about yer legacy?"

He growled at her, annoyed at her completely invalidating how he felt. "You don't get it, _Lady Masque._ I come from a long line of master thieves. Part of that means improving on what we do and writing it down for future generations! And I have _nothing!"_ He swallowed around the lump in his throat, shame hanging heavy on his shoulders.

"Uh huh." She walked in and leaned on the balls of her feet to get in his personal space. "Two points. _Un,_ you are _only_ twenty-four. And you've been a bit busy if the bulletins on ThiefNet are to be believed, _oui?"_

" _Oui,"_ he agreed without thinking about it, slowly calming down. He normally avoided speaking French, less his native accent start leaking through, but right now the familiarity of it helped.

She reached up, using her fingertips to bring his chin up a little. _"Et deux_ , this is chickens before they hatch, boyo."

" _Quoi?"_ was his oh-so-articulate response.

He felt a slight shudder run through her, but she didn't give him enough time to think about it. "Don' yah need a female you can _actually_ breed with first?"

His mouth would have dropped open without her hand under it. Oh, he'd somehow managed to forget. Half of the reason why they had come back to the past was to stop the computer program in the present from killing female raccoons. Even if he and Carmelita didn't work out, without females of his species, his family was a dead-end anyway. The end of the Cooper line through attrition. "Right," he managed to say weakly.

Lady patted his cheek and looked over to Karin. "Coopergiwa- _san_ , a letter arrived while you were out." She held out a scroll. "It looks like there are some other nobles visitin' Minamoto, and their wives and daughters are havin' a shindig. I thought we could use the opportunity to our advantage but wanted to get yer eyes on it to be sure."

Accepting the scroll, Karin gave it a quick read and nodded. "Yes, we can attend this, see what the other nobles think of Minamoto's actions." She handed the letter back. "We will need that to get past the guards, so please do not lose it. If you will lay out two of my _kimono_ , I will finish with Sly- _san_ here."

With a nod, Lady moved to exit the forge. Only to pause and look over her shoulder. "Two?" she repeated dubiously.

Karin gave her a calm smile that revealed absolutely nothing. Sly was very happy not to be at the receiving end of it.

* * *

Later, Sly was sitting at the table in their room, looking over Bentley's recon photos and trying to piece out another clue for lack of anything better to do, when the screens parted. He looked up and grinned at Karin, who was sans mask and dressed very differently. "I take it you are not joining us, Sly- _san?"_ she asked politely.

"You guessed correctly. And you clean up nice," he said with a nod of his head. "Forgive me, I don't know the names of all of these things." He paused and added. "And who is us if I'm not going?" He thought the letter indicated this was for the women only, were the girls going? They seemed kinda young…

Karin raised one arm to observe the dusky purple sleeve. "It is called a _h_ _ō_ _mongi,"_ she said mildly, expertly ignoring his question. "The color is…dark indigo? I believe that is how it translates. And the flowers are _kikyo,_ or—"

"Japanese bellflowers, also called Chinese bellflowers or balloon flowers," a more familiar voice drawled. "Karin- _san,_ are yah sure 'bout this?" Huh, Lady must have gotten permission from Karin to use her first name. She slowly walked up, and why she was so slow became clear.

She was wrapped in layers of silk, sky-blue over a very muted pink. A darker pink and the same shade of the under layer formed the flowers of the pattern to her _kimono_ , with gold leaves and tracings underneath the flowers that were scattered all over it. While Karin's sash was white, with a gold-on-gold belt and white chord over it, Lady's was more intricate with more of the darker pink as the sash, a white belt with a bigger version of the flowers in gold, and then the dark pink for the chord.

Karin's hair was still in its low knot, but she had managed to smooth Lady's waves into a high and tight bun with a decorative pair of blue chopsticks. The familiar mask had been replaced with a Kabuki style one, picking up the pinks and the blues like over exaggerated make-up.

Sly didn't know what it said about him that he found himself preferring her old mask.

Before he could do more than open his mouth, Lady pointed at him. "Not. One. _Word_. I am sewn into this, and I am bound from hip to thigh. Don' mess with me, Cooper."

Snickering, he raised his hands up. "I was just going to comment on how… lady-like… you finally look."

Her shoulders stiffened, her tail bristled, and Lady held out her hand. "May I, sugah?" she asked.

Karin coughed into her sleeve, and then slide a pink fan with gold and white flowers on the silk, the steel spines look far too sharp for Sly's comfort, into Lady's open palm. "Of course, but I advise not hitting him with it until you are used to the weight."

Lady weighed the fan in her hands, and judging by how she handled it, it was indeed a lot heavier than what Sly would expect typical fans to weigh. He eyed the similar looking one tucked away into Karin's belt, the silk black instead of pink, and decided he wanted to stay on the samurai daughter's good side. "So I take it you're passing Lady off as the relative instead of me?" he asked as a distraction.

"Yes, with a horrible burn on her face to explain her mask," Karin said with an annoyed look at Lady. "Since I could not talk her out of it." Unrepentant, Lady tugged on the bit of her bangs that was still free. Huffing, Karin looked to Sly. "I trust that you and the other boys will serve as guards? Shinji is staying home to watch over the kits. I expect to come home to complete mayhem and three exhausted children."

He nodded. "Sure, let me go get them." He paused on his way out the door, twisting to look at Lady. "At least the mask gives you an excuse not to talk," he teased.

She reached up, brushing his face with the back of her hand. She said…something…in a smattering of fluent Japanese that made Karin cough again. When Sly just stared at her, dumbfounded, she rapped the back of his head with her fan. Hissing at the heavy whack of steel to his head, he rubbed at the tender spot as he went to go find the others. One day, he would learn. He smirked a little though, glad he got to ruffle her feathers a little.

* * *

Lady took a chance and managed to herd Karin towards the koi pond that served as a focal point for the elaborate garden. It was a poetry and moon viewing party, so many of the noblewomen were either sitting on soft pillows on the deck or walking slowly together. It made sense for a visiting cousin to get overwhelmed by the strange crowd and seek a few moments along with Karin, so Lady was going to take shameless advantage of it.

"Well at least we know that Minamoto ain't actin' with the rest of the nobles, just on his own," she offered for what little comfort it was worth.

Karin sighed softly, leaning a little harder on Lady's arm as they walked around the edges of the water together. "I was not expecting this tonight…" she murmured. "Is what is happening in the village giving them nerve?"

"Possibly," Lady said with a sigh of her own. "Yah married outside of yer class, which ain't helpin'."

The older raccoon winced at the reminder. It was all the gossips had wanted to talk about tonight, despite gentle nudging by both females to find out what was happening with the red panda clans. "They are not even giving you the full story," she complained with a scowl.

Lady patted her arm. "Then tell me it now, so I can stand up for yah," she coaxed.

Karin fidgeted and looked over the pond water. "I was the oldest of my parent's children," she murmured softly, trusting Lady to watch for prying ears. "All of us girls, except the youngest. My parents needed help, so I helped raise my sisters and kept the household running. Our blood is thick, but with no sons, we were very poor trying to keep up with appearances."

"And then Shinji came around," Lady supplied when Karin took too long to continue.

The brown-toned raccoon grimaced. "His father," she corrected. "He wanted an alliance between the two families, and my father could not find any reason to say no. I think he expected Shinji to marry one of my younger sisters, but…" Now a small smile tugged at the corner of Karin's mouth at the memory. "He made me smile, and he said it was all he needed to know that I was the one he wanted. No one else would have ever called me a flower—I was too grim, too serious. But to him, I was as beautiful as the _kimono_ I inherited from my grandmother, like you are wearing now."

Lady was suddenly very glad that she had been treating her borrowed finery with the utmost care. Heirloom garments deserved it, and Karin probably was counting on passing it down to one of her own daughters someday. "Your daddy must have been _so_ happy," she said sarcastically.

Karin snorted, muffling the sound in her sleeve. "I had to bully him into agreeing," she said dryly. "When it was one of his younger daughters, he was willing to chalk it up as a loss without too much ceremony. But my mother was frail and delicate, not suited to running the household. Without me, he would have to rely on one of my sisters showing initiative." She paused and added, "But after he saw Shinji and I together, I think he changed his mind. Mother, though…"

"Had vapors?" Lady suggested, and then had to explain what that bit of slang meant before Karin agreed to it. Effectively, Karin's mother had gone off about her daughter of noble blood and dignity marrying a common merchant. The response of royal blood and dignity meaning nothing if there is no food on the table won Lady's affections for Karin, who seemed to have her priorities clearly in place. She glanced at the moon to use it as a gage of the time. "Come on, let's rejoin the party," she suggested, tugging Karin to circle around the pond and join the gaggle of noblewomen.

Unknown to them, a series of shadows were perched on the garden wall, the thick stone giving them a wide ledge to balance on. Their big ears twitched as they took in the group, zeroing in on the two raccoons who were separate from the rest of the party. They shared looks and coded chatter, and then drew their short swords, preparing for an all-out assault to get their targets.

Pellets rolled on the ground, stopping in front of the bats and releasing a noxious gas that burned their noses. With coughing and shrieks, they tumbled down off of the wall, desperately trying to escape the smoky fumes.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" a male voice drawled. They rubbed at their weak eyes and looked up at where they had previously been prepared to launch. The male raccoon from the other night who had interfered was balanced there, cane casually swinging.

"Looks like a bunch of bats to me, Sly," a gruff voice said from the side street. Several of the ninja twisted to see a large mammal unknown to them blocking that escape. He cracked his knuckles, and with his great size, he was going to be the easy victor unless they overwhelmed him with pure numbers.

"He was being rhetorical, Murray," the final, reedy voice said. It belonged to a turtle in a metal mechanical chair that scared the bats more than they wanted to admit.

They had fallen into a trap.

* * *

 ** _Ohayo_ —Japanese, good morning**  
 ** _Un_ —French, one**  
 ** _Oui_ —French, yes**  
 ** _Et deux_ —French, and two**  
 ** _Quoi_ —French, what**  
 ** _hōmongi_ —Japanese, a formal type of kimono typically worn by married women**  
 ** _kikyo_ —Japanese, bellflowers**

 **Lady—Furisode, sora-iro with momo-iro and sakura-iro chrysanthemums with gold leaves and circles pattern going up the sleeves, legs, and over the left shoulder, sakura-iro under layer, momo-iro obiage and obijime, white obi with gold overly large chrysanthemum pattern. Momo-iro fan with white and gold chrysanthemums. Seen on my dA account.**

 **Karin—Hōmongi, futaai with white Chinese bellflowers along the edge of the sleeves, bottom, and over the left shoulder, white obiage and obijime, gold-on-gold geometric pattern obi. Black fan with white and gold bellflowers.**


	7. A Wise Man Once Said

**Sorry, ya'll, birthday weekend, I forgot the update until it was bed time**

* * *

 **A Wise Man Once Said…**

* * *

Sly hopped down off of the wall, closing in on the bats. "Boys, we need to have a little talk," he said casually, like he was talking to a group of friends. "Namely, about your attacks on the Coopergiwa family."

The bats shared looks, and then their swords were directed at the gang. The shrieked command was in Japanese, so he had no idea what was said, but the results were clear. The bats weren't going down without a fight.

That's fine, neither were they. Sly had noticed familiar switches had returned to his cane after the night at the ballet, and now felt like the perfect time to reintroduce it. With a press of his fingers, electricity that mirrored lightning began to crackle along his cane. When he snapped it against the ground, the current solidified into blue-white crackles along the crook.

For his part, Murray clapped his hands, calling on a technique that Sly thought the hippo had forgotten. But much like his Ball form, he still remembered his Fists of Flames. The bats who had the misfortunate of being hit by him quickly ran off shrieking as their fur or clothes caught on fire. But the flames would putter out quickly, designed more for a shock factor than to cause permanent harm like Carmelita's gun.

Bentley was a lot easier. The turtle had a veritable horde of grenades to pick from. It was just a matter of picking which one he wanted to use.

Ninja weren't that easily cowed, though. Sly and Bentley quickly found themselves overwhelmed by sheer numbers, no matter how many bombs went off. It was Sly who noticed that the bats were using their distraction to either as one darting off, single or as pairs. "They're getting away!"

"The Murray has it handled!" With that, their muscle stopped fighting and instead backed up for one epic belly flop. While many of the bats fled, several more were stunned, unable to move.

Sly wasn't one to waste such an opportunity. He dug a rope out of his pack, handing one end of it over to Murray. Between the two of them, they had the trio of remaining bats tied up in a jiffy. He twisted his cane, using it to tilt up one of the bat's chins. "So, about the Coopergiwa family?" he asked.

Ears twitching, the lead bat in the middle said something grabbled in Japanese that Sly couldn't make heads or tails of. Of course, their luck had to run out now on being able to understand their opponents. He sighed, looking over to Bentley, who was rapidly typing as if trying to translate.

"Sugah, I don' think you want to know what he just said about yer mama," a familiar voice drawled behind them.

The three boys turned and looked. Lady and Karin both were approaching in all their finery, their sandals clacking as they walked. Both had their fans out, and Sly winced as he realized that not only were those twice-cursed things heavy with their steel frames, but the spines were sharpened.

"You can understand them?" the boys…and Karin?...chorused.

Lady's head tilted to the side. "Yes. Karin- _san_ and her family use the Kansai dialect of Japanese. The bats are from northern Okinawa, so they speak the Ryukyuan language of Kunigami." At the blank looks, she held up her hands. "It's like comparin' Latin-based languages together—French, Spanish, and Italian. Just enough differences that they can' understand each other."

"And your teacher was from Okinawa, so you know both?" Sly guessed, half-sarcastically.

She shrugged. "I can _get by_ in both. You have special tricks, I have languages, Cooper."

"Well, you can question the prisoners then," he said with an exaggerated bow.

Stalking past him, she grumbled, "Do I look like yer Interpol girlfriend?" but she rattled off a question at the captured bats before Sly could contest. Lady stood over them, her mask making her seem like an impartial judge. That sparked some cowering and anxious chatter. She nodded her head slowly, and tilted her chin, giving Sly the feeling she was looking towards him now. "Note in the one on the right's pocket," she said.

Reaching into the pocket, he pulled out a piece of paper. The kanji on it might as well be gibberish, but the picture at the bottom got his attention. He tilted it to show it to Karin.

She grimaced. "The bamboo flowers and leaves of the Minamoto clan," she confirmed.

"Let's leave this rabble for the headman to deal with," Bentley suggested, adjusting his glasses. "Now that we have proof, we should go back to the compound and make a plan."

The group shared nods, and while Sly was reluctant to leave his rope, he knew it was for the better cause. Karin wrote a note for the headman, pinning it to the shirt front of the lead bat, and that left them to catch up with the other three.

And it gave Sly an opening. "So, cousin…" he drawled, crossing his arms behind the back of his head. "You and Shinji make the family and the family business work, right?"

Karin tilted her head, eying him curiously. "Yes. You have questions, Sly- _san?"_

He grimaced. "More like I am in desperate need of advice from a feminine source. I am lacking in those, and Bentley and Murray are…not experts in this regard."

"Ah. This is about the fox," Karin said wisely, her tail twisting through the air. "The one you are attempting to court?"

"Courted, albeit unconventionally, won, then fell out with, then sort of made up with, and now… I don't know," he sighed, shoulders slumped as he admitted the completely the mess of his love life. Karin hummed, encouraging him to keep talking. "I spent years flirting with her! She spent years chasing me! And it was a good partnership, it was. I helped lead her to all sorts of busts, got some really awful people off the streets."

"But?" Karin prompted.

Sly gave her the side-eye. Yeah, the problem was obvious, wasn't it? "She couldn't let me being a thief go," he finally muttered. "I couldn't get her to understand what a master thief was. I can't even get Lady to understand! And so when the opportunity came, I… pretended I didn't remember anything. She made me believe I was her partner still, but she made me… a member of the same law she served," he hedged, not wanting to get too specific to his time period.

"And then you were happy together," Karin concluded with a sigh of her own. "Except you are a Cooper."

"Except I'm a Cooper," he agreed. "I got hit with the itch, and then we found out that there was a mess that I had to deal with. But she didn't understand, not until the end, and then when I came back from _that_ blowing up, she… She tested me. And I failed, but I'm so mad at her for testing me in the first place! I gave up everything, I was going to give up everything again before…" He trailed off, not sure what else to say.

She tilted her head, looking at him. "It sounds to me, Sly- _san_ , that in this relationship with the fox, you are always the one to make a sacrifice to your identity and way of life. And if something occurs that aids your mutual cause but requires you to pick up what you left, she is insecure. Is this correct?"

He shook his head, his ears flopping. That sounded…wrong. And very bad on Carmelita's character. "She's just trying to do right by the law," he argued in his…paused…girlfriend's defense. "And she is still figuring out where her comfort level is with my life meeting with hers."

"But you said you were going to give up those aspects of your life," Karin persisted. "Again. And yet before you could tell her, she began to test you."

"Yeah, that was bad," he admitted with a cranky grumble, but his tail switched nervously. "But I think the fact she next saw me with Lady was why that reaction was so bad."

Karin huffed. If her cousin was going to ask for her advice and then get defensive, there was no point to continuing this conversation. She folded her hands in front of her, trying to think of something her father-in-law would say that would give Sly something to stew on for a couple of days. "Cold tea and cold rice are bearable, but cold looks and cold words are not," she finally settled with.

Sly knocked his hat askew, scratching at his scalp absently. "Tea and rice?" he repeated.

She snorted at him. "Think about it, Sly- _san_. You will figure it out." Eventually.

"Hey guys!" Murray waved his arms, catching their attention. Lady and Bentley had stopped walking, waiting on the group to gather up a little more. "Bentley has said that I can go ahead and start getting the _ronin_ gathered up and chased out of town. He says that they are just going to get in the way regardless." He fidgeted with his gloves. "But we gotta have somewhere to keep them."

Karin hummed, slowing to a stop as well. "There are a family of dogs just down the road who run an inn," she suggested. "If you exhaust them enough, they may decide to stay there for a time. It would offer us a window."

"A fight with the Murray will wear them down," he agreed, slamming his fist into the palm of his hand.

"Just don't get caught, I don't want to commit any jailbreaks tonight," Sly joked, which got some snickering from the other boys as they remembered the awful jail bird outfit from when they visited Tennessee.

"I feel like I'm missin' a joke," Lady muttered to Karin behind her fan, making the older female chuckle.

* * *

Sly frowned over the tablet and book spread out on the low table. Bentley was muttering at his own displays, putting together a plan for them to confront the headman as quickly as possible. It had to be tonight, or else the enemy warriors would be back on patrol. Of course, Bentley had proven that he was getting much better at dealing with time crunches and pressure, so it was just a matter of time.

In the meanwhile, Sly was taking a crack at the puzzle that was Karin's section of the Thievius Raccoonus. He trusted Bentley, he really did, but sometimes it took another thief to look at a puzzle and figure out the best way to solve it. Of course, he couldn't read kanji at all, so the original writing didn't do him much good unless the clue to solving it was supposed to be a picture. But he had to try at least.

Of course, Lady chose just then to swan into the room. Karin had helped devest her of her borrowed finery, so she was back to normal. Sly chose to ignore her, and the slight sense of relief that she was back to what he was used to.

Not that Lady decided to ignore _him_. "Whatcha up to, sugah?" she asked, leaning over his shoulder to look at some of the writing.

"Looking at Cooper secrets, so shoo," he said, reaching over to snap the book shut.

Unfortunately, Karin had been right behind Lady. She snagged the book, twisting it to read the kanji there. Well, that answered one of Sly's questions—she could read, at the very least.

He looked up at Lady and scowled. "You aren't a Cooper, remember?" he said rhetorically.

"I'm also _bored,"_ she pointed out, and then flounced away to look over Karin's shoulder, making Sly growl. "Oh hush, I can' read Japanese this old anyway," she snapped at him.

"Both of you behave," Karin admonished with the absent-minded air of a mother with wily kits. She tilted her head as she mouthed some of the words. "This is my section, yes?" she confirmed with Sly.

"Uh, yeah," he said, looking up from the tablet. "It describes your coin magnetism techniques, as well as some of your life history, but it's pretty brief compared to normal. I thought it might have gotten lost when branches of the family combined."

"Hmm," Karin hummed without commenting, continuing to read.

"So where did this family of so-called master thieves start, anyhow?" Lady asked.

"Egypt," Sly answered, though it sounded like a dirty word when he said it. "And we _are_ master thieves."

She rose her brows and came to stand over his shoulder again, resting her chin on top of his head. "There are other theivin' families, sugah," she pointed out. Lady ought to know, even if her situation was…complicated. But like Hell was she trotting out her little sob story for this group. Not yet. "What makes you and yers so special?"

"I told you, we only steal from other thieves," he said with exaggerated patience.

Lady snorted to show what she thought of that. Really? He was going to trot out that line again? "I could do that too, but would that make me a master thief?" Sly jerked to look up at her, his brow furrowed and his mouth half-open in protest. She continued before he could actually say anything. "Uh huh. That's what I thought. So there's more to it. Talk, Cooper."

He scowled up at her. "I mean, there's a level of tradition to it," he pointed out with a growl at her. "We've been doing this since ancient Egypt. We create techniques, improve on our ancestors', and pass them down to our children."

"And so do the other thievin' families," Lady repeated herself with her own taste of exaggerated patience. "And in fact, I could argue the Coopers are actually the _worst_ at it. Everyone knows about yah, and you've made more mortal enemies and rivals than I can shake a stick at. And it's why we are here, by-the-by."

Sly sputtered at disbelief of his family being called the worst of the thieving circle. Lady let her tail sway from side to side, enjoying annoying him more than she was really ready to admit to. He just made it so _easy_. There probably was more to this "master thief" nonsense, but it was too much fun to needle him when he thought he had a sound argument and she saw big ol' glaring holes in it.

A barking laugh that was in no way lady-like made the turtle and two bickering raccoons all jump. They jerked their heads to look over at Karin, who had her hand over her mouth, trying to muffle her laughter as she set the book down. "Oh, oh my goodness…" she gasped out, trying to catch her breath. "Oh, I definitely did not write this, Sly- _san_. I do not have such a turn of phrase."

"Okay, I gotta know the joke," Lady said, jumping up and over the table to look at the book. "What does it say, Karin- _san?"_

Still snickering, she pointed to a specific set of kanji. "This is a saying, if you look at it right. 'Even a lone mutter in a well is known after three years.' And then here is another. 'It is dark one inch ahead of you.'"

"So, secrets come around to bite yah, or news travels, and expect the unexpected…or who can guess the future," Lady said slowly and then blinked. "Oh. Wait. Is this… Is this a warning about time travel and keepin' yer mouth shut about it?" she said, trying to lean closer to the book like if she could get closer, she'd be able to understand it. "And what the heck is that supposed to be?"

"It is a dragon," Karin said, tilting her head. "And it is… Jumping? Between the columns."

"Leaping," Sly said with a groan, smacking his head against the table. "It's a leaping dragon. It's a nod to a move that your son, Karin, is going to invite in a few decades. Rioichi must have been the one to transcribe the Japanese into the merging of the books." Between meeting Sly twice, Rioichi would be the best person to do such a thing. Underneath that old man of the mountain thing that the old ninja had going on, Sly was realizing that he was hiding a mischievous streak a mile long. That little brat.

"Interesting," Bentley said, looking up from his own work. "I don't remember the section seeming any different than from when we first collected it from the Five, so this isn't something that was affected by temporal dissonance. So we have always been on these trips, and it was noted in the Raccoonus. Rioichi must have used Karin's section as a way of warning others who might encounter us multiple times to play dumb if they saw us, and to keep quiet on family legends detailing with it, even in the official history."

Something about that made Sly's brain feel strange, almost like he had a word he wanted to say and he couldn't remember it. Hadn't it been the book that had led Bentley and Murray to realizing he was in ancient Egypt when he had gotten lost? But he couldn't remember what it was that he had done _specifically_ to create that clue.

"I wonder how many of your other ancestors have done similar?" Bentley mused.

Karin snorted. "Well, I will go ask Shinji to make copies of what I have currently written. You can add them to your copy of the book as an addition, yes?"

"Right. If you'll do that, Coopergiwa- _san_ , I will get set up here for our briefing." Bentley looked at his display, a slight smile tugging at his face. "I think I've figured out the best plan. And Lady, we're going to need your skills specifically."

"What skills might that be, _cher?"_ Lady asked, sounding skeptical. Sly didn't blame her. The turtle hadn't exactly been complimentary of what Lady was doing within their little group.

Bentley's answering, silent grin wasn't particularly comforting either. Sly was having flashbacks to the Carmelita as a belly dancer fiasco. Covering his eyes with one hand, he slunk down a little. Oh, he had a feeling he was going to want to have an easy exit once Bentley laid out his plan.


	8. Operation: Warfan

**This is the last chapter in this one! I have the next one loosely set down, I'm hoping to have time to monkey with it this summer and start posting in the fall, fingers crossed.**

* * *

 **Operation: Warfan**

* * *

"I wanted it noted that I am doin' this under heavy protest."

"Aww, come on, Lady. It can't be that bad."

"Tell yah what, Cooper. We'll put _yah_ in this get-up, and _I'll_ go help the turtle."

" _What?!"_

"Chill, Bentley, she isn't going to do that."

"I dunno, Cooper, you'd make a pretty girl…"

The answering growl over the comms made Lady feel a lot better, but she had to knock it off. And not because the turtle's shout had her ears hurting. Her target was approaching. Lowering her fan with a snap, she pattered her way down the hall. God, she hated _geta_. "You must be Minamoto- _san,"_ she greeted the red panda in fluent Japanese. She gave a polite bow of the correct level if she really was an outlying member of a _samurai_ clan greeting a _daimyo_. (Karin had taught her, since Lady only knew modern, polite levels of bowing.)

The red panda's dour expression did not endear him to anyone. "I do not know you," he said slowly, returning her bow with a nod of his head. "My lady…?"

"Coopergiwa," she lied, though it wasn't something she really wanted to say. "One of the outlying branches."

His brows rose, and he gave her a more thorough look. "I did not know there was a golden beauty among the _samurai,"_ he said smoothly, stepping more into her space.

Ugh, how did Sly stand doing this sort of thing with that fox inspector? At least a red panda looked close to a raccoon, she could pretend this wasn't gross. She gave her fake laugh, twittering rather than the breathy one that was genuine. She reached up to touch her mask absently. "I am no beauty, my lord, but thank you."

Eyes flickering over her mask, she saw him build up a story of assumptions in his mind, all without her having to say anything. A birth mark or accident, like they'd told the other noblewomen. But Lady knew how to flirt without having a face, regardless of culture. She let her sleeves slide down her arm, exposing more of her wrist and forearm as she brushed her hand lightly along his arm. "What brings you so far from home, my lord?" she asks coyly, even though she was well aware of his plans.

He hummed, leaning into her personal space, just like she intended. "Business with the headman, concerning your clanswoman," he admitted. "Are you visiting her?"

"For a time," she said breezily. "I am not yet betrothed, so my father has me visiting relations to see if any know of a suitable gentleman."

"Then I eagerly await when you visit my lands," he purred, his smile oily as he touched the back of his hand to her mask. Never had she been so grateful that she had porcelain between her actual flesh and another's touch.

* * *

Sly lowered his binocucom from where he was spying on Lady. "Alright. I take back my approval for this," he muttered.

"It's too late for second-guessing, Sly," Bentley said over the comm, practical as always. "Lady is going to have to handle herself. We have to gather up the rest of those ninja, so they don't attack Karin when she takes proof to the headman."

"Right, stick to the plan," Sly confirmed. He jumped over the roof tops, scanning for signs of movement. With Lady out and about, the ninja had to be active in hopes of finding Karin.

A series of fireworks went off to his left. Bentley's signal, they had just passed him. Using his hook to slide down a series of ropes, Sly reached the area more easily and found a gaggle of bats. "Not tonight, gents," he joked, swinging in with electricity sparking along his cane. It was light work. He'd just gotten this group when Bentley came over the comm with another sighting. It was going to be a long night.

The van bumbled into view, the back emptied out of the time machine to free up room. Murray slid out of the driver's seat and opened the back door. "I've got these, Sly!" he promised.

Giving a touch to his cap, Sly scurried to the next location. It took three similar drops to get them all gathered up. He tapped his comm to relay a message back to Bentley, and set out for the headman's office.

Bentley tapped into his computer at the all clear from Sly, and turned towards Karin. "Alright, Coppergiwa- _san_. Lady is keeping the _daimyo_ busy, and Sly and Murray took care of the ninja. There isn't going to be a better time to talk to the headman."

She gave him a tense nod. "I will take your word for it, Bentley- _san_. Please keep an eye on my cousins. This could turn at a moment's notice."

"I've got eyes on everybody here," he promised. She jumped out and away, and Bentley hoped he hadn't just lied to her.

* * *

Karin rolled into the headman's office from the window. The office was more than big enough for such a maneuver, the headman's title had passed through his family for several generations now and they also owned the majority of the rice fields, so his home was larger than most. While it was simple, it was on par with her own home or that of her childhood growing up.

The serow looked up, startled from his desk. "Coopergiwa- _san,_ what—?" he began to protest.

"Please, Kino- _san,"_ she said, walking towards his table-desk. "I must speak with you urgently. I am being framed!"

He paused his reaction, as well as reaching for a drum to call for help from any of the locals within hearing distance. "Framed?" he repeated with a tone of skepticism. But he wasn't dismissing her outright, which if he was completely in Ken's pocket, he would.

Karin had to press her advantage. "I have been keeping to my family and the compound," she promised. "And then I heard of what was being said of me in town. Things I could not have done while I was with my kits! My relatives came to visit, to help get to the bottom of it." She reached for Kino's hoof. "Please believe us, sir. It was not us."

"Then who was it?" the serow asked, his eyes narrowing. "Raccoon mischief is well known, Karin _-san._ I tried to defend you, but without anything to back up our claims, they'll have my head along with yours."

"We're in position," Sly whispered in her ear through the strange device that Bentley had set there. (Lady had grumbled for some reason when it didn't take very long at all.) She tugged at Kino's hand, bringing him to the window. She slipped open the shutters, letting him look down into the street. There, the bats squeaked and struggled against ropes holding them all bound up together like a straw bundle in the middle of the road.

Kino started, leaning out the window to see closer. "The ninja clans? But why? They never get involved unless…"

"Unless they are paid," Karin finished the thought for him.

He looked at her, and she could see that he was putting the puzzle together on his own. His expression darkened, and he strode towards his desk. "I will write the _daimyo_ at once, how dare they bring their political maneuvering into our quiet village," he complained.

The door slammed open. "Karin, we're out of time," Lady said, snapping the threads holding her kimono shut to rip it off and kick off her _geta_. She had her boots hidden under the folds of fabric, and was wearing her normal thieving clothes underneath, just needing small adjustments. She even managed to change out the porcelain masks with only a few seconds to spare.

Karin threw her the odd cane that both of the younger raccoons used… Just as Minamoto came storming in after her, his eyes glistening. He froze, though, at seeing both females in front of the headman. Particularly the beauty he had been flirting with before she disappeared on him, now standing in strange clothes that loaned her the mobility of a warrior.

And Coopergiwa Karin. The steel and silk maiden who had slipped from his fingers years before. Wielding her familiar _naginata_ , despite reports from his ninja that the weapon had been rendered useless during the failed kidnapping attempt.

"Sir, yah might wanna get outta here," the gold and cream female murmured, and the serow took the opportunity to flee through a side door. Coward. But that was why Ken's plan had been working, to get him the only thing he had ever been denied.

He wasn't going to let anyone stop him from getting it now.

Drawing his _kabutowari_ , the heavy blade possessing a small hook making it ideal against opponents in heavy armor or who favored reach weapons, he launched himself at the two females.

Lady let out a swear in French as she jerked out of the way of the swing. That was going to break her bones if it actually connected. "Sly, get your furry tail up here!" she shouted over the comm, especially as she realized that the lord was deliberately trying to keep her away while he engaged with Karin.

Sly jumped through the window, and quickly saw the problem. They were fighting someone with an actual understanding of tactics. Karin relied on reach, but judging by her fighting, she was limited by Minamoto's weapon and he was trying to get in close quarters. Every time Lady went in to try and stop him, she was forced to retreat due to the weight of the blade as it practically displaced the air around him.

Bentley was babbling in Sly's ear, trying to figure out a series of tactics that would work. But Sly didn't need it. He darted into the fight, grabbing Lady by the waist to stop her from running in. "Together," he told her. "Like the floors. You go high, I'll go low."

"That might _actually_ work," Bentley said in disbelief.

Lady huffed in exasperation at the turtle's doubt, and the pair of them circled around, going in at the same time. While Minamoto was dodging swings for his legs and blocking the ones for his head, it let Karin get out of the way and go in for a strike. Minamoto would do a wide sweep, sending all three raccoons scattering until their next opportunity.

It was during one of those scattered sweeps that Lady got an idea. Grabbing the _obi_ she had shucked earlier, she tossed one end at Sly. "Let's wrap this up," she suggested.

"Oh, bad pun," Sly scolded, but he took the end of the long bit of silk.

"I've heard you boys use worse," she threw back at him as they stretched it out.

Seeing what they were doing, Karin gave a twist of her _naginata_ , sending Ken stumbling backwards…and into the _obi_.

"What?" he growled, reaching to tug at the fabric. But Lady and Sly were already running in circles, quickly tying him up in the gold, flowery silk.

"I will take that," Karin said, snagging his _kabutowari_. She also swept his legs out from under him, sending him crashing to the ground as he struggled against the heavy cloth. But it wasn't so old that he could get leverage to rip it. "It's safe now, Kino- _san,"_ she called.

The serow poked his head out and shook his head. "What a mess he has made of my office, and of your reputation to boot," he said in disgust, folding his arms. "Any suggestions on what we should do with him, Coopergiwa- _san?"_

"Let us keep him in the cells until our own _daimyo_ can fetch him," she suggested. "Without pay, his _ronin_ will leave on their own. And with their own compromised, the ninja clan will pull back and cut their loses." He nodded and left the room to arrange the messages and let the _ronin_ and ninja know there was no more coin coming their way.

But that was bothering Lady. She kneeled down in front of the red panda, tilting her head. "Yah know, if you'd wanted the local members of the Coopergiwa Clan dead, it would have been easy to just overwhelm their compound. But instead yah played this slow game."

"What's your point, Lady?" Sly asked, looking at the two.

"Somethin' slow like that, it's to keep control. Like usin' a scalpel instead of a glaive." Lady tilted her head and leaned in close to Ken's face. "So the question is, who were you tryin' to avoid hurtin'?"

He sneered at her, eyes glinting in rage. "I will not tolerate this indignity," he spat at her.

"Indignity. Like a _samurai_ marryin' a common merchant?" she suggested lightly.

Ken froze.

Lady nodded. "That's what I thought." She looks up at Sly. "This wasn' an attack against Karin. He wanted her discredited so she'd be sent home to her folks in disgrace. No one would let Shinji keep the kits, makin' them sittin' ducks, so to say. Without kits, he could pressure Karin's daddy to give her to him to manage. Especially with all that gold he was flashin' around."

"Except his family lands were not so rich as to afford all of this," Karin said as she approached with a frown, realizing that Lady had stumbled on a rather large hole in their understanding of Ken's plan. "Where is he getting so much in funds to hire all of these people? To potentially bribe my father?"

"It did not matter," the red panda said, eyeing Karin with a stern frown. "I never knew his name. He offered to fund anything, any plan, as long as you were mine and the kits were gone."

Sly shook his head. So even though Clockwerk was more than likely involved in some way, Ken didn't have any information to make tracking it down in some way. They weren't even sure if this was the original Clockwerk, and thus potentially causing chaos to the timestream, or if it was the back-up that they were after.

Two villagers—a blacksmith judging by the smudges to the wolf's leather apron and another of undetermined occupation but a huge bear that Sly had no desire to tussle with—came in with bows. "Kino- _san_ has said that we are to take Minamoto to the holding cells," the bear said in a slow rumble. The lack of honorific made the red panda hiss in outrage, though he silenced when Sly thumped him on the head with his cane.

The wolf darted in and held up his hands to Karin, bowing deeply. "We offer our deepest apologies to you and your family, Coopergiwa- _san,"_ he said, his voice oddly melodious compared to what Sly had heard from the mechanical wolves in England. "We should have believed in you and your husband rather than an outsider."

Karin put her hands into the wolf's and bows in turn. "Your apology is accepted," she promised.

Lady leaned her elbow on Sly's shoulder. "Yah know, even though we didn' get much out of this to help with our problem in Paris… I don' think we were completely wasted here."

He grinned down at her. "I actually agree." For once, this wasn't something that could make or break the future. It was just helping. While he wish he was able to do it back in his own time period, well. It was what he actually enjoyed doing. Hopefully the next location would be just as relaxing.

* * *

Rioichi carefully carried a bucket of ashes that he had stolen from besides the kitchen hearth, where _Haha_ kept it to make soap. If he set up his trap just right, he'd get both Lady- _san_ and Sly- _san_ , and then they'd just have to stay until laundry day and their clothes could be clean. It was a perfect plan.

A hard whack hit the back of his head, making him drop the pail. "Ow, ow, ow!" he whined, reaching up to rub the back of his head.

"Did I knock sense into you yet?" his mother asked, her tone patient and yet not tolerating any arguments or excuses.

Rioichi slowly looked up to see her crossing her arms and tapping her foot…soot all over her now pristine floors. Perhaps he hadn't thought this through very well. _"…Hai, Haha,"_ he tried to say with big eyes.

"Oh, my son…" she sighed. For a moment, he thought he might actually get away with it. "I cannot find it in my heart to believe you," she said, reaching down to snag him by the ear before he could make a break for it. "Come along, perhaps some meditation will help you learn better than to lie to your mother."

"But _Haha_ , Sly- _san_ and Bentley- _san_ are leaving soon!" he protested, this time his sniffling real.

But his mother could not be budged. "You will meditate, and I will come fetch you when they are actually leaving," she said. "We will all get our chance to say good-bye. Your sisters have grown quite attached to Murray- _san_ , and I would not want to deprive any of you." She then pointed in the direction of the rock garden.

" _Hai,"_ he muttered back, remembering that Kaya and Kiyo had been wilting for days. It wasn't fair of him to try and be selfish. Not to mention that these relatives were on important work. He had to think of that too.

Tail between his legs, he went to go find the best spot on the meditation rocks. He just wished there were more raccoons his age (and sex) to play with.

* * *

Like she promised, Karin fetched her son just as the van came out of hiding and the visitors were done getting things settled for their next location. Murray picked up both girls and swung them around in his arms, making them squeal through their tears. Bentley was patting Rioichi on the head, looking awkward at how the young kit was trying to cling to him.

Karin used the opportunity to approach Sly. "Take care of yourself, Sly- _san_ ," she admonished, pulling him in for a hug. She pulled back to shake her finger at him. "Listen to Murray- _san_ , and stay away from the mystic techniques until he says you have finished healing. He is much wiser than his speech would suggest."

"You're one of the few who realizes it," Sly said with a grin as he rubbed the back of his head. "I promise to behave."

She nodded, and looked over his shoulder. "It looks like Lady- _san_ does not do good-byes, so you will have to wish her my best," Karin said with a short bow.

Looking over at where the female raccoon was leaning against the back of the van, Sly couldn't exactly argue with that observation. Aside from the flicking of her tail, she must as well be a statue. Ah, well. He had a turtle to save. "Hey there, little ninja," Sly said, grabbing Rioichi and pulling him around to stand in front of him. "Now, I need you to promise me something."

Rioichi rubbed at his eyes to get rid of his tears…and missing Bentley using the chance to escape to the van. "What is it, Sly- _san?"_ he asked.

Sly held up his finger. "We might see each other again, but things could be tricky. So I need you to play a joke with me." He winked to try and entice the little boy into playing a game that Sly hoped would save all their fur and shells.

"What joke, what joke?" the little kit asked eagerly, eyes bright.

"If I act like I have never seen you before, like you shouldn't recognize me? Play along," Sly says. "You'll get the punch line later, I promise." If the book was anything to go by, anyway. Sly still smarted from missing the translation code.

"I can do that!" Rioichi promised. Sly held up his pinkie…and had to explain how a pinkie promise worked, but the little future ninja seemed thrilled by the idea.

"Sly!" Bentley called from the van. "Hurry up! Henriette isn't going to wait forever!"

Shaking his head, Sly walked around to the back of the van, where Lady was opening up one of her mask storage boxes that they had brought from the future. This one was a Venetian mask, set in just the right time period for Henriette "One-Eye" Cooper to be in Italian waters. "He does realize that with time travel, it literally makes no difference?" she asked him quietly.

"Better to just go along with it," he whispered back.

"I heard that!" the turtle drawled from where he was setting up the time machine. He held out his hand, and Lady carefully gave him one of her prized masks to set into the machine. It was time for their next adventure.

As the van disappeared from view, Karin cuddled her despondent kits, even as Rioichi managed to wave good-bye to the blue vortex.


End file.
